Avalanche Forecast
Issued: Feb 8th, 2014 8:00AM
The alpine rating is , the treeline rating is , and the below treeline rating is Known problems include Wind Slabs.
catherine brown,
Parks Canada
Summary
Weather Forecast
A ridge of high pressure will remain in place one more day. Expect a mix of sun and cloud today with alpine temps around -13 and light ridge top winds. A frontal system will move into the region Sunday afternoon bringing light snow, winds increasing to moderate from the SW. Moderate snow is forecast for Monday and Tuesday, with rising temps.
Snowpack Summary
5-10cm of soft snow overlies hard snow surfaces of sun crust on steep solar aspects and wind slab at higher elevations. This snow has seen some wind affect and is slow to bond to the underlying layers due to cold temps. A new surface hoar layer is down 5cm at lower elevations. The mid pack is well settled. Cold weather is faceting the snowpack.
Avalanche Summary
Ski-cuts are producing fast sluffing to size 1 in the upper 5-15cm in loose, faceted snow. The faceted snow entrained mass and flowed into low angle terrain over 250-300m downhill. While these sluffs were not big enough to bury a person, you would certainly be pushed over by them, disconcerting in "no-fall" zones with cliffs below.
Confidence
Timing, track, or intensity of incoming weather system is uncertain on Monday
Problems
Wind Slabs
Thin pockets of wind slab are present on exposed treeline and alpine lee features. North and east winds have created reverse loading conditions.
Caution in lee and cross-loaded terrain near ridge crests.Avoid travelling in areas that have been reverse loaded by winds.
Aspects: All aspects.
Elevations: Alpine, Treeline.
Likelihood
Expected Size
Valid until: Feb 9th, 2014 8:00AM
