Regions
Banff Yoho Kootenay.
The cool weather of Tuesday locked down the snowpack with frozen surface crusts into alpine elevations. We expect the same for Wednesday - avalanche and travel conditions are good, but the ski quality is poor.
Weather Forecast
One more day of overcast skies and cool weather before another big warm up. Wednesday look to remain below freezing at treeline, although valley bottoms will again reach 7 degrees. Another warm ridge of high pressure arrives on Thursday, and temperatures will skyrocket for Thursday afternoon and Friday.
Snowpack Summary
A skiff of new snow on top of surface crusts that remained intact today except at valley bottom elevations. The morning snowpack is strong when frozen, but this can rapidly break down with warming. In many places the snowpack is sitting on a deep persistent layer of facets that has been avalanching with solar heating over the previous week.
Avalanche Summary
Today remained cool, with no new avalanches observed or reported. Our field trip through Surprise Pass showed a snowpack locked up from the cold temperatures with no new avalanches anywhere.
Problems
Loose Wet
Loose Wet avalanches are the release of wet unconsolidated snow or slush. These avalanches typically occur within layers of wet snow near the surface of the snowpack, but they may quickly gouge into lower snowpack layers. Like Loose Dry Avalanches, they start at a point and entrain snow as they move downhill, forming a fan-shaped avalanche. Other names for loose-wet avalanches include point-release avalanches or sluffs. Loose Wet avalanches can trigger slab avalanches that break into deeper snow layers.