If more snow arrives than anticipated overnight tonight, watch out for storm slabs sitting on top of crusts.
5cm can be expected to fall as snow in the alpine and upper treeline into Monday with SW winds. Pay attention to recent accumulations that overlie crusts. Local slab formation will vary greatly with temperature and wind effects.
With freezing levels rising and small amounts of rain forecast on Sunday evening, expect heating to create moist snow at lower elevations.
A size 3 skier-triggered avalanche occurred on Saturday afternoon size 3 skier-triggered avalanche occurred in a closed area within the Lake Louise ski resort. Two people were caught. One was partially buried and survived. One was fully buried and did not survive. The avalanche was reported to be 200 m wide and 550 m long with a crown depth of 40-50 cm.
Almost daily accumulations of new snow are competing with new sun crust formation on solar aspects with multiple buried crusts present in the upper snowpack. On northerly aspects, up to 40cm of recent snow remains preserved with buried temperature crusts as high 2200m. The basal snowpack remains weak in shallow locations with facets.
About 5cm of snow is expected overnight. Freezing levels will be about 2100m so expect this in the form of rain at the valley bottom. Wind should be light to moderate from the SW.
More details can be found in the Mountain Weather Forecast.
