Persistent Slabs
- Alpine
- Treeline
- Below treeline
- Likelihood
- Likely
- Size
- 2
You think this guy look scary... you should see the snowpack structure!
Last weeks high and dry weather created a layer of weak surface snow or what we call near surface facets. In the short term it's loud, recrystallized powder and good riding. In the long term it turns into a headache, especially once its buried, because it becomes the next problem child in the snowpack. And that's exactly our setup right now as last weekend's storm snow buried and preserved this weakness. This becomes a potentially problematic scenario, especially as we add additional weight to our developing snowpack. Think about an upside-down cake... or stronger snow on weaker snow. This type of layering leads to tricky avalanche conditions, where we can trigger slides from a distance or from adjacent slopes, and where we can pull the entire log pile down on top of us. And once triggered, today's avalanches may break wider and deeper than you might expect.
But you don't have to ride blind... so, look for signs of unstable snow like whoomping sounds and sudden collapses of the snowpack or shooting cracks in front of your skis, board, or sled.
