Grand Mesa

You can trigger an avalanche on open, planar slopes that break 1 to 2 feet deep on weak snow below. The buried weak layers are widespread on west through north to east-facing terrain, so these are the most worrisome slopes. You can reduce your risk of being caught in a dangerous slide by not tempting steep terrain and sticking to lower-angle slopes. Watch out for small wet avalanches in the afternoon. For visual impact, here's a montage of the last week's large avalanches from around the state.

On February 20 and 22, backcountry snowboarders were caught and killed in avalanches in separate incidents. One west of the town of Silverton on a terrain feature locally known as The Nose in the Middle Fork of Mineral Creek drainage. The other was near the summit of Berthoud Pass in a terrain feature locally known as The Fingers. In both fatal accidents, the avalanches broke several feet deep and spread wide across multiple terrain features. You can read the preliminary accident reports here and here.