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Avalanche Forecast

Archived

Dec 26th, 2018–Dec 27th, 2018

Alpine
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.
Alpine
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.
Alpine
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.

Regions

Kootenay Boundary.

A weak layer will continue to linger over the holiday season. A conservative approach to your terrain selection is the best way to manage it. See the forecaster's blog here, which describes this persistent problem.

Confidence

High -

Weather Forecast

WEDNESDAY NIGHT: Cloudy with light snowfall, freezing level below valley bottom.THURSDAY: Mix of sun and cloud, light northwest winds, alpine temperature -10 C, freezing level below valley bottom.FRIDAY: Increasing clouds over the day, light to moderate west winds, alpine temperature -12 C, freezing level below valley bottom.SATURDAY: Cloudy with snowfall, accumulation 5 to 10 cm, strong southwest winds, alpine temperature -5 C, freezing level rising to 900 m over the day.

Avalanche Summary

One small wind slab avalanche was triggered by explosives with a depth of about 15 cm. Otherwise no new avalanches were observed on Tuesday.

Snowpack Summary

Around 5 cm of snow fell on Wednesday. This fell on a thin sun crust on southerly aspects and small feathery surface hoar in sheltered areas.Beneath this, around 50 to 100 cm of snow is poorly bonded to a rain crust and a weak layer of feathery surface hoar and sugary facets. Although there has not been a reported avalanche on this layer for about a week, snowpack test results tell us that it is still possible to trigger. It is best to remain conservative and travel cautiously with this layer in the snowpack.The lower snowpack is well-settled.

Problems

Persistent Slabs

Persistent Slab avalanches are the release of a cohesive layer of snow (a slab) in the middle to upper snowpack, when the bond to an underlying persistent weak layer breaks. Persistent layers include: surface hoar, depth hoar, near-surface facets, or faceted snow. Persistent weak layers can continue to produce avalanches for days, weeks or even months, making them especially dangerous and tricky. As additional snow and wind events build a thicker slab on top of the persistent weak layer, this avalanche problem may develop into a Deep Persistent Slab.