Gunnison

Cooler weather is reducing the threat of most wet avalanches, and the snowpack is generally safe.  As the day warms up, stay alert for the isolated threat of a cornice fall or wet avalanche.  You can minimize your risk by traveling earlier in the day and one at a time in steep terrain.  

The snowpack continues to recover from the weekend heatwave. Stronger refreezes the past two nights and cooler daytime high temperatures are working in tandem to limit meltwater production, especially on those northerly slopes that haven't fully transitioned to a mature spring snowpack yet.  Snow surfaces have evolved over the past ten days of warm and sunny weather to the point where wet loose avalanches are difficult to trigger in all but the steepest terrain once crusts thaw. Thus, wet loose activity has taken a downturn since the warmup peaked on Friday and Saturday.  We observed limited wet slab activity during last weekend's heatwave, thanks in part to the late March meltdown, which already saturated many suspect slopes harboring dry, weak layers.  Although the snowpack has not experienced a deep freeze since the warmup escalated, concerns for wet avalanches are diminishing as we get further from last weekend's major meltwater event.  Temperatures are still mild enough that wet avalanches remain an isolated threat.  Traveling earlier in the day and aiming for ideal corn snow (instead of wet, punchy snow) is a reliable strategy for reducing exposure to wet avalanches. 

The good news about last week's heatwave is that even fewer slopes harbor the dry, persistent slab structures that have given us pause in steep, rocky terrain with thin and variable snowpacks.  High, due north terrain is still mostly dry, and we can't completely rule out that issue.  Given the past month's relatively dry and warm weather pattern, these concerns are isolated and either unreactive or very difficult to trigger.  The most likely cause of a dry slab avalanche under our current conditions would be a large cornice fall onto high, north-facing terrain.