At the mid and high elevations, skiers and riders have the potential to trigger soft stabs that formed during yesterdays heavy snowfall. The the chance also continues for a person to trigger deeper instabilities involving weak faceted snow near the base of the snowpack. Identifying features of concern and evaluating the snowpack for the presence of the old weak layer is essential for safe backcountry travel. Avalanches at low elevations are unlikely today.
Yesterday's storm that brought over a foot of snow to some locations was accompanied by south to southwest winds. in steep avalanche terrain that was loaded by this event, soft slabs with depths to eighteen inches could be triggered by backcountry travelers.
Large persistent slabs avalanches up to four feet in depth can be human triggered on steep slopes at the upper elevations. These slabs lie on north facing terrain at 8000 feet and as elevation increases, the weak snow layer increases in size and quickly involves more and more aspects. Determining which slopes that could still avalanche is difficult and slabs involving this layer could fail after an avalanche path has been tracked when a particularly weak or thin spot on a slope is impacted.
A broad low-pressure trough will remain over the region through Saturday. However, conditions will remain generally dry. On Thursday skies will be partly to mostly cloudy. Conditions will be colder with overnight lows in the single digits and daytime highs in the teens in the mountains and in the 20’s in the valleys. Light winds overnight will increase to 10 to 20 miles per hour from the west-southwest during the day.In the mountains large slab avalanches could be human triggered on steep slopes. These dangerous slabs lie upon a persistent weak layer near the base of the snowpack on north facing terrain at 8,000 feet and on west through north to east aspects at 9,000 feet and on southwest through north to southeast aspects above an elevation of 10,000 feet. Determining which slopes could still fail is difficult. Avalanches involving this weak layer could be 2 to 4 feet deep and could be triggered by a snowmobiler or skier after an avalanche path has been tracked. In these areas the general avalanche hazard is moderate. The general avalanche hazard is low below an elevation of 8,000 feet. In that terrain the general avalanche hazard is low.
