Make conservative terrain choices while warm temperatures continue to consolidate the upper snowpack into cohesive slabs atop a widespread, persistent weak layer.
Recent snow continues to settle into cohesive slabs over the late-January surface hoar/crust/facets layer. Warm temperatures and sun will continue to stress this layer, increasing the likelihood of avalanches through the day.
Clear skies and above-freezing temperatures throughout the day will weaken the upper snowpack and potentially lead to wet loose avalanche activity.
A widespread avalanche cycle occurred over the weekend on the late-January surface hoar layer atop a crust, producing avalanches up to size 2.
Since then, several smaller natural and human-triggered slab avalanches (size 1–1.5) have been reported across the region, also failing on the late-January layer.
In general, recent avalanche activity has been most common near treeline, on a variety of aspects.
Generally, crusty, refrozen surfaces are expected by Thursday morning. Moist snow surfaces may exist in isolated areas that do not experience a full overnight refreeze.
With warm temperatures and sunny skies forecasted, snow surfaces are likely to become moist throughout the day on all aspects and elevations.
Approximately 30 to 40 cm of snow sits atop a layer buried in late January, consisting of a widespread surface hoar layer resting on a melt-freeze crust, with up to 15 cm of weak, faceted snow immediately below the crust.
The mid and lower snowpack remain well settled, with no significant concerns.
Wednesday Night
Clear skies. 30 km/h west ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature 4 °C. Freezing level 3300 m.
Thursday
Sunny. 20 km/h west ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature 5 °C. Freezing level 3500 m.
Friday
Sunny. 20 km/h southwest ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature 4 °C. Freezing level 3100 m.
Saturday
Mix of sun and clouds. 1 to 3 mm of precipitation as snow or rain at treeline. 30 km/h southwest ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature 0 °C. Freezing level 2200 m.
More details can be found in the Mountain Weather Forecast.
