Southern San Juan

Steep wind-drifted slopes are the few places where you could trigger an avalanche. Look for smooth, rounded pillows or hardened snow below ridges on open slopes to indicate this problem. Even a small slide that takes you through shallow exposed rocks or sailing off a cliff could be dangerous.

At lower elevations, the surface slab continues to deteriorate. You can trigger a small loose avalanche on steep convex features and near rocky outcroppings where the surface snow has lost cohesion.