East Slopes Central

Expect a windy day on Friday, with potential for shallow wind slabs to form in alpine terrain. Most snow surfaces will hold a variable surface crust leftover from the pronounced warming event, bring tools for traction on steep slopes. Lower elevation and south facing slopes may soften during the daytime.

The main story with Friday's weather for much of the zone should be the winds. Expect very windy conditions to develop during the afternoon, and in some areas you may find freshly drifted, shallow wind slabs. Look for active wind transport near ridgelines. You may be able to identify areas that are drifted with new snow, and others that are blown clear or don't appear thickly pillowed. If you observe shooting cracks in dry snow, then be sure to avoid those areas on steep or consequential slopes. 

In other areas, likely lower elevation slopes that receive direct sun, wet loose avalanches may become possible during the day. Look for moist, sticky snow that could entrain into an avalanche on steeper slopes.

A large, spring storm left areas in the zone close to the Cascade crest with up 2-3 feet of snow through Tuesday. Accumulations in the Wenatchee Mountains were in less, closer to 1 ft. Since then we've seen a pronounced warming event on Wednesday and Thursday, and likely a number of wet loose avalanches. Observers reported being able to easily trigger small loose wet slides on lower elevation, shaded slopes near Holden and mushy snow at Mission Ridge on Thursday. Some higher elevation slopes may still hold dry snow, but are likely to be variable and may have a crust. On Tuesday and Wednesday heavily wind affected snow was reported from alpine terrain of the Chiwaukums and Mission Ridge.