Loose Wet
- Alpin
- Limite forestière
- Sous la limite forestière
- Probabilité
- Possible
- Taille
- 1–1.5
The snow conditions will change quickly as the day warms up. Stay ahead of these changing conditions by regularly stepping off your equipment, feeling the snow, and looking for other signs of unstable wet snow like recent roller balls, pinwheels, or small wet snow sluffs. If the snow starts feeling mushy, unsupportable, or you start sinking up to your boot-tops in wet snow, it's time to consider moving away from avalanche terrain.
Clear skies and slightly cooler temperatures last night should have allowed for an ok refreeze, but it won't last long as the day warms up. Expect loose, unsupportable wet snow to form quickly on sunny slopes as the refreeze crust melts in the hot, sunny weather. Higher sun angles mean that wet snow could form on a wider range of aspects as well. The most wet snow should form on the most sun-exposed slopes, and wet loose avalanches may become possible on some slopes if enough wet snow develops.
Repeated melt-freeze cycles and previous rain events have transformed the snowpack into late-spring or even summer-like snow with well-established drainage. This means that most wet loose avalanches should remain small. Still, an isolated, larger wet loose avalanche might be possible on a long, steep slope, where a small wet loose avalanche could entrain more snow as it slides downhill. Keep in mind that small avalanches can have increased consequences in exposed terrain.