Avoid avalanche terrain. Solar input and rapidly rising freezing levels will likely result in a widespread natural avalanche cycle.
Check out our latest blog about the forecasted warming.
North facing terrain at upper elevations may have reactive wind slabs. These avalanches have the potential to step down to deeper weak layers.
Cornices will weaken during the warm up and could trigger large avalanches on the slopes below.
Two reactive layers exist in the upper snowpack. One is down 40 cm and the deeper one down 80 to 150 cm. We expect to see a widespread avalanche cycle on these layers with intense warming through the weekend.
Warming and periods of sun will produce widespread wet loose avalanches, especially on steep sun-exposed slopes. These may step-down and trigger deeper slab avalanches.
The region continued to see a wide range of natural, explosive controlled avalanches up to size 3 and human-triggered avalanches up to size 2 on Wednesday. Natural cornices failed with the solar radiation triggering the slopes below to size 3.
We expect to see a widespread natural avalanche cycle over the next few days. Avoid avalanche terrain and exposure from overhead hazards (open slopes, cornices) as avalanches could run full path.
Moist snow surfaces will extend into the alpine (except for high north-facing slopes) with rising freezing levels, especially on sun-exposed slopes.
Recent storm snow totals 40 to 60 cm across the region. The new snow sits on sun crusts and wind-affected snow from previous strong southwest winds.
Below this, two layers of surface hoar and sun crust can be found in the top meter of the snowpack. One from late February and the other from early March.
A hard widespread crust formed in early February is buried about 80 to 150 cm deep. This crust has a layer of facets above it and continues to be reactive.
The snowpack below this crust is generally not concerning except in shallow alpine terrain.
Thursday Night
Mostly clear with some clouds. 10 to 20 km/h northwest ridgetop wind. Alpine temperatures near -2°C. Freezing levels 1000 m.
Friday
Sunny with few clouds. 10 to 30 km/h northwest ridgetop wind. Alpine temperatures are a high of +3°C. Freezing level rising to 3000 m.
Saturday
Sunny. Mostly light winds but in places gusty to 40 km/h from the northwest at ridgetop. Alpine temperatures high near +5°C. Freezing level rising to 3200 m.
Sunday
Sunny. 15 km/h west ridgetop wind. Alpine temperatures low of +2°C and a high of +8°C. Freezing level rising 3200 m.
More details can be found in the Mountain Weather Forecast.
