Wind Slabs
- Alpin
- Limite forestière
- Sous la limite forestière
- Probabilité
- Possible
- Taille
- 1–1.5
A mix of snow surfaces, including crusts and near-surface facets, will be the bed layer for newly formed wind slabs today. Solar aspects have gone through several days of freeze-thaw before the storm and northerly aspects held chalky cold snow with faceted snow grains at the surface.
The terrain below ridges, in start zones, gullies, convexities, or slopes that collect windblown snow will be loading today. Wind slabs sometimes have a texture on the surface and feel stiff to the hand. Wind-driven snow can sound hollow and feel firm. Wind can deposit 3-5 times more snow on a slope than it can fall from the sky. Pay attention to places where the wind has piled up the snow. Shooting cracks, collapses, and whumpfing sounds are all red-flag warnings that the snow is unstable.