Great skiing can be found! Be cautious navigating the recently developed wind slabs and loose dry/cornice activity in couloirs or on climbs.
20-30 cm of new snow and moderate to strong alpine winds has created windslabs in lee alpine and treeline terrain. Continued moderate wind & light flurries may contribute to slab development Wednesday.
Buried crust/facet layers exist in the upper snowpack on steep solar aspects and may be more reactive with the new snow load. These persistent layers can be tricky to assess so use caution on slopes where they are present.
20-30 cm of new snow in the last few days has been sluffing easily in steep terrain. We expect this problem to improve, but it could still be problematic in gullies (ice climbing/steep skiing terrain) with moderate winds forecasted for Wednesday.
SW flow continues bringing light flurries for the next few days, approximately 4 cm/day adding to the 20 cm of recent snow. Moderate West winds continue for Wednesday/Thursday. Freezing levels will drop to around ~ 1300m for Wednesday and Thursday.
15-30cm of new snow sits on a buried sun crust on steep solar aspects, and either previous wind effect or soft snow on other aspects. Several buried sun crust layers exist on steep solar aspects,. but the most concerning crust has been the Feb 16 down 40-50 cm and Jan 30 down 50-80 cm. The lower snow pack is generally well settled.
Generally obscured visibility today with flurries. Several cornice triggered slabs occurred in the alpine on Mt. Rundle today up to size 2 on a NE aspects and a few loose dry avalanches. Local ski hills were reporting some windslabs in alpine and treeline terrain, mainly in the size 1-1.5 range.
