Persistent Slabs
- Alpin
- Limite forestière
- Sous la limite forestière
- Probabilité
- Likely
- Taille
- 1–2
Continue to use caution when traveling in the mountains and minimize your exposure to avalanche terrain. In addition to obvious avalanche paths, you may be able to trigger avalanches in steep open trees. Avoid large, open slopes 35 degrees and steeper. Stop and re-group in safer terrain, well out from under overhead avalanche paths. Professional guides and astute backcountry travelers are still avoiding big terrain and unsupported slopes. When dealing with this tricky snowpack, prioritize signs of instability and keep you decisions conservative and simple.
You’ll find the February 8th facets buried 2-3 feet below the surface with an underlying crust. The snowpack structure is widespread on all aspects and elevations. Another round of snow and wind in the next 48 hours will build more fresh slabs. These avalanches should be considered guilty until obviously innocent. Watch for signs like collapses (whumphs) or tests indicating propagation/triggering. Prioritize information that indicates a potential for triggering avalanches over observations that point at relative stability.
As we get further from the last avalanche cycle, signs of instability are becoming less frequent and sometimes less obvious. But they are there. On Sunday near Lanham creek, I poured over the snowpack identifying grains and performing many tests. After emerging with contradictory test results, we experienced a large rumbling collapse 2000ft from the profile site. The collapse was all the information I needed to avoid avalanche terrain.