Galena Summit & Eastern Mtns

Triggering large avalanches that break widely remains a disconcerting possibility here. Slides that break in the upper 1-2 foot of the snowpack will be smaller, but easier to trigger. Much larger avalanches failing on weak snow near the base of the snowpack will be harder to trigger, but hard to survive if you do. Smaller, wet snow avalanches may occur on steep, rocky slopes where the snow is being melted by the sun. Dense, freshly formed wind drifts may be sensitive to your weight in steep, upper elevation terrain. 

50 Shades of YELLOW

Yesterday, the Avalanche Danger dropped to MODERATE for the first time since January 10th. Each level of the danger scale describes a broad range of conditions, and conditions vary widely across our Forecast area. In this zone, you'll encounter a snowpack underlain by a prominent basal weak layer as well as some obvious issues near the snow surface. Here's a look at the world you'll walk out into:

The December drought produced a widespread layer of weak snow. This layer was loaded by storms in January and February and has produced many very large avalanches along the way. On most slopes, this layer is buried beneath a very dense, 2-3 foot thick slab of snow. This slab makes impacting the weak layer underneath more difficult, but triggering a slide involving this snow remains a possibility. This slab+weak layer combination is your primary concern in the majority of this zone. We can stack the odds in our favor by avoiding the type of terrain where triggering one of these slides is most likely:  big, alpine terrain that is steep, wind-swept, and peppered with rocks. Here, the snowpack has a lot more trigger points where we can access the weak layers underneath the very dense slabs. 

Closer to the surface you'll find another prominent weak layer: sun crusts, rain crusts, and facets formed at the end of January. A smattering of natural and human-triggered avalanches involving this layer clearly indicate that it is capable of making avalanches, but stability varies significantly from slope to slope. On some slopes, you'll find a strong bond at this interface, while neighboring slopes may be harboring an unstable slab+weak layer combination. In this zone, this layer is only buried around 12-16 inches down and in most locations you'll need some wind stiffening to encounter problems here. 

A few smaller issues are going on at the snow surface. Winds picked up significantly yesterday. Look for dense, relatively thin wind slabs that have been plastered into the terrain by the ongoing wind. While these aren't likely to be big, triggering a small hard slab can pull the rug out from under you and send you tumbling downslope. In steep, rocky, sunny terrain, wet loose avalanches will become possible again as the day warms. If the snow you are moving through is wet, these types of slides are on the menu. Pay attention to what is above you, these may release naturally and they can pick up a lot of steam in steep terrain.

As we choose to enter avalanche terrain with buried weak layers, we accept the outcome of those choices. If we're lucky, we can play in big, steep terrain, get tons of snow in our faces, and return home to tell our friends about it. If we are not so lucky, we trigger an avalanche that can wipe our house off its foundation. The goal of this forecast is to give you the information you need to travel how you want to travel in the mountains. What you do with that information is completely up to you. If you are entering avalanche terrain today, be aware that triggering avalanches large enough to bury you (or much worse) remains a worrisome possibility.