South Rockies

The slopes with the best riding conditions are also the most dangerous - steep alpine slopes

Low - Due to the number of field observations

Friday: A mix of sun and cloud with a chance of light snow flurries. Freeing level near valley bottoms and light southwesterly winds. Saturday: Increasing cloud and wind with flurries in the afternoon and freezing level remaining in valley bottoms. Sunday: 5-15cm of fresh snow possible by sunday morning, with another 2-5 throughout the day. Freezing level near valley bottom with moderate to strong southwesterly ridgetop winds.

Reports from Wednesday are limited but include evidence of a large natural avalanche cycle at alpine and treeline elevations with fresh debris visible in many paths and roaring avalanche heard throughout the day.

Continued snowfall brings total treeline snowpack depths to over a metre, with even more in the alpine, but it diminishes quickly below treeline. Recent storm and wind slabs, probably 40-70 cm thick, are bonding poorly to the old snow surface buried early December, which is probably a crust and/or a combination of facets and buried surface hoar. Below that a thick layer of facets is probably bonding poorly to the thick mid-November crust. We're receiving very little information from the region, so please consider sharing your observations via the Mountain Information Network.