Elkford West
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 28th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 27th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Cornices.
Published: Mar 26th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Cornices, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 25th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet, Wind Slabs.
Published: Mar 24th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet, Wind Slabs.
Published: Mar 24th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 23rd, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 22nd, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 21st, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 20th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 19th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 18th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 17th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 16th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 16th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 15th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 15th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 14th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 13th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 12th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 11th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 10th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 9th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 8th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 7th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 6th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 5th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Wind Slabs.
Published: Mar 4th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Wind Slabs.
Published: Mar 4th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 3rd, 2025Mount Fox Slide Path
Made an ascent up a slide path on Mount Fox. Areas in which had seen sun during the day were good skiing as hard layer was more than foot below the snow surface. Further up the slide path where no/limited sunlight can reach the surface the snow was boilerplate firm. Made for less than ideal turns. No whumpfing or any signs of instability, even in areas of higher loading.
domobad94,
Tuesday 2nd January, 2024 11:10AM
Late season in Elkford
<p>Late season visit to Elkford today. We found about 15 cm of soft snow from the weekend over a couple of crusts. The snow was sticking to the crusts well and was unreactive in our tests. The snow was dry all day as well. We saw no new avalanches.
There was some fun riding to be had on north aspects where the upper crust was a bit softer. It was starting to snow in the afternoon and intensified on our drive home. Maybe tomorrow will be a surprise powder day! </p>
southrockies,
Tuesday 18th April, 2023 4:20PM
Seek The Shade …….
<p>Headed up to Mear Lake today with light hearts, having seen the overnight low of minus ten (-10 ! …. mid April!) ….. we were disappointed with the freeze however. We figured that the 10 cm of recent soft snow had insulated that 20 cm of moist snow from Monday’s rain event.
Once the sun came around, we saw numerous Loose Wet avalanches to Size 1.5 on steeper sunny slopes in the Alpine and at Treeline.
We also saw numerous older Wet Loose avalanches up to size 2.5 from Sunday / Monday /Tuesday
Winds were calm all day, with no evidence of wind in the recent soft snow.
Skiing was good in the shady places we could find, where we enjoyed 10cm dry snow. Those places were up at treeline and as low as 1900 m in the full shade (full north, or in shady mature forest).
The groomed trail from Round Prairie was pretty boney for the first couple of km’s, and we heard that the Overflow route was mostly grass ….. </p>
southrockies,
Friday 14th April, 2023 5:20AM
Sun.Pow.Fun
<p>Sunny day today north of Sparwood in the Nordstrom area. We didn’t need the ski crampons that we brought thanks to 10 to 15 cm of recent snow that made the travel on south facing slopes better than expected. This new snow started to become moist as we were leaving the field making the ski down a little grabby but still fun. We had great visibility and didn’t see any new avalanche activity but there was evidence of older cornice-triggered slabs. North facing slopes were still soft and dry. There was almost no wind, and temperatures at 2200 m were -5 with some cloud.</p>
southrockies,
Tuesday 4th April, 2023 3:40PM
Big One in Smith
<p>Photos from a friend riding into Smith Basin. They encountered a big slide that ran across the trail at the first chute. They were first tracks onto the slide so it probably came down late the day before.</p>
dave.baines,
Friday 24th March, 2023 1:30PM
Deep at Elkford
<p>Lots of natural avalanches from yesterday's storm. All aspects alpine and treeline. Mostly size 2s with occasional size 3. We didn't see any new avalanches today.
30-40 cm of recent storm snow at 1800 m. Appeared wind affected treeline and alpine. Below treeline was amazing riding.
Areas with less than ~140 cm of snow on the ground had a very facetted and unsupportive bottom of the snowpack. </p>
southrockies,
Wednesday 15th March, 2023 3:30PM
Sleddin’ ? Stay on the Trail !
<p>Lots of km covered today (on excellent groomed trail …. Big thanks to Elkford Snowmobile Assoc. groomers !).
We ran west from Elkford up to 1900 m. In our travels, we saw lots of terrain on all aspects and at all elevations. Saw no recent avalanches, nor any recent wind affect.
The couple of older avalanches we did see had started in high, cross-loaded start-zones and had scrubbed down into the facets in the bottom half of the snowpack. The hadn’t run full path, but were still Size 2.5 to 3, so we took care to keep out from under similar features.
We dug into the snow in a few places, and found a similar story: the bottom half is weak facet-crystals, ….. really unsupportive off-trail, and a poor foundation for our snowpack.
With clear skies and this later-in-the-winter period, the sun was definitely hitting steeper south facing slopes and we’d expect to see sun crusts continuing to develop in these places. No solar-released avalanches however, thanks to cooler temps (high of-10) and light winds.</p>
southrockies,
Wednesday 8th March, 2023 5:30PM
Double down
<p>In Elkford today we found the wind at work up high. Recent new snow was being transported by moderate to strong northwest winds. We were getting shooting cracks on wind slabs built over the past few days at treeline and open ridge features. There were a few natural size 1 to 1.5 wind slab avalanches from steep terrain features. Temperatures were still cold with -19 at 2300 m, at our profile location where we had no significant test results.
Cornices are large and looming and with the wind affect in open terrain we decided to ski a sheltered terrain feature where the skiing was really good.</p>
southrockies,
Friday 24th February, 2023 5:10PM
Koko Claims Avalanche
limartin833,
Monday 20th February, 2023 6:10PM
Koko Claims Avalanche
limartin833,
Monday 20th February, 2023 6:10PM
Great Turns At Mear !
<p>Today at Mear Lake area we found 5 to 10 cm of soft snow at 2300 m that skied pretty well, thanks to a consolidated layer 35 cm deep that was supportive to our skis. Below this layer we found a generally faceted snowpack that is working hard to round (get stronger) but it isn’t there quite yet. Down 80 cm there were some larger facets that we decided to test with a PST (Propagation Saw Test). We had a failure (45/100) that suggests propagation and slab avalanches on this layer are possible. We didn’t have great visibility but did notice that cornices are growing in this area and are overhanging and unsupported.</p>
southrockies,
Wednesday 8th February, 2023 5:00AM
sMEARing some turns...
<p>Today in Elkford we found 30 cm of soft snow that has accumulated over the past few snowfalls. This sits on a consolidated layer from the Christmas storm, below this layer the persistent weak layers that developed earlier in the season have gained strength. We were pleasantly surprised that the snowpack is improving. There was some wind throughout the day with a bit of snow moving around.
We did avoid a convexity to enter a sheltered treeline slope and had some really good turns.</p>
southrockies,
Thursday 12th January, 2023 4:50PM
Mear lake
<p>Snow seamed to be decent for most of the day, did a small pull in an untouched area. As I turned out I noticed I set off a small avalanche. The shelf appeared to be around 12” thick. I was able to ride away to the right side of the debris un harmed. For here we stayed away from open areas and stayed in the thick trees</p>
Jason Miller,
Monday 2nd January, 2023 8:10PM
Mear Lake
<p>Today in the Elkford area we were pleasantly surprised with dry snow starting at 1500m. There was 20cm of accumulated storm snow that was soft and powdery. On our sled approach, we rode over some debris from a large (size 3) natural storm slab avalanche that we estimate occurred Tuesday early in the day.
We toured up to an alpine shoulder along a ridge to 2300m. As we approached the more open, wind-affected terrain we started to get whumpfing and cracking.
We dug a profile and found 130cm total snow depth. The top 20cm was soft storm snow, over a more consolidated old wind slab layer. These sit on a 50cm layer of large facets (sugary snow crystals) that developed from cold temperatures.
Our snowpack tests showed a weakness where the old wind slab and facets meet our test result was sudden (ECTP 11 down 40cm on facets sz 2-3) Extended column test 11 taps down 40cm from the surface. This along with the signs of instability had us choosing conservative low-angle terrain.</p>
southrockies,
Wednesday 28th December, 2022 5:10PM
Elk Valley
<p>Rained to 2000 m. Snowing above but still wet. No avalanche activity observed.</p>
tyrel.musil,
Monday 26th December, 2022 4:20PM
Frozen Lake, slabfest
<p>Found fresh slabs on all open terrian on north,south and east aspects. Headed for tall Timber were the skiing was a lot better then open terrian.</p>
wardsbd,
Saturday 24th December, 2022 7:50PM
Its still there...
<p>Nice sunny day in Mear Lake area. We saw some natural slab avalanches in the alpine most likely dating from the weekend. We were curious to see how the persistant weak layer was doing there, so we dug a pit around 2000m. We found the mid-nov weak layer (surface hoar down 50 cm) and it was still quite reactive to our snowpack tests. Boo. Above the weak layer is a windslab that is either hidden by soft snow in protected areas or exposed in the alpine. We felt that it was a good idea to stay away from steep alpine areas, especially where the windslab would vary in thickness (see how the fracture of the avalanche picture posted goes from thin to thick).</p>
southrockies,
Thursday 15th December, 2022 4:40PM
Mear Lake
<p>Today in Elkford we found a generally weak and faceted (sugary) snowpack. At Mear Lake (2050m) we found 125 cm snow depths. the most recent snow was light and fluffy (low density) and the past few storms have accumulated 20 - 30cm. We also found a weak layer ( a surface hoar and facet mix) that was reactive to snowpack tests down 55cm. (ECTP (16) down 55 cm on SH/FC). There was limited visibility into the alpine but suspect that light to moderate winds was redistributing the most recent snow at upper elevations directly lee of high points. With this mostly unconsolidated snowpack, early-season hazards are still lurking. </p>
southrockies,
Tuesday 6th December, 2022 7:00PM