South Rockies

Strong winds from the West are expected to keep loading lee slopes tomorrow and possibly trigger large avalanches.

Good

Tonight and Sunday: The tail of the system exiting is expected to leave more precipitation tonight. Light to moderate amounts are forecasted for tonight (around 15 mm in water equivalent) and none during the day tomorrow with strong winds from the W. Freezing levels should fall to valley bottom tonight. There could be some clearings in the morning tomorrow. Monday: Another warm front is pushing in bringing light amounts of precipitation during the night between Sunday and Monday, strong Westerlies and freezing levels rising to 1500 m. Tuesday: A ridge building over the regions should bring dryer and warm temperatures.

Some natural avalanches were reported today, but the visibility was limited and there was very few observations. I suspect an avalanche cycle happened today, more details to come tomorrow.

Up to 40 cm of storm snow was most likely very touchy today. The wind already started redistributing the snow and more windloading lee of strong westerly winds in the alpine and at treeline will keep avalanche conditions dangerous tomorrow. The new windslabs will most likely be very touchy and could possibly be triggered naturally. The storm snow is expected to have to potential to sluff in steep sheltered terrain. Cornices will continue building and could fall with this additional load. Avalanche professionals are still concerned that the facet/crust and surface hoar layer down between 70-100 cm and the depth hoar and basal facets situated at the bottom of the snowpack could be triggered. These persistent weak layers are showing a high spatial variability and also some variable snowpack test results. In other words, they are spotty and moody. The facet/crust layer at treeline has been mostly reactive on E aspects and the depth hoar layer in the alpine is still concern especially where the snowpack is thinner.