North Columbia
Heavy and wet but alpine skiing
This week, only significant avalanches have been on south aspects. Polar aspects have only produced small wet loose slides to size 1.5.
South aspects did step down below March 19 and 5th sun crust layers in last couple days. Some to ground from very steep terrain.
We have been boot packing up couliors and skiing steep pillows with only minor pillow failures. Wind slabs at top of couliors have been bonding quickly and unreactive.
Wet snow has allowed for steep skin track setting for entertainment purposes :) Skiing below 1900m is no longer ideal or recommended, but may recover this week with incoming forecasted snow and temps.
We have avoided all sunny aspects.
Skid 1900m to 2600m today on norths.
Significant settling has occurred, 30 - 40cms or more, in last two days.
Glaciers are cool... no rain this week. Been snowing heavy coastal snow since Wednesday.
Crust will be significant factor tomorrow (Saturday) below 2300m or on sun affected slopes.
Cornice failure hazard is high
No evidence here of the deep persistent from end of Jan / Feb waking up on north aspects.
toddthetoad,
Friday 28th March, 2025 6:00PM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Storm Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 28th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Storm Slabs.
Published: Mar 27th, 2025Naturals on solar aspects at Fairy
Natural avalanche cycle as expected to size 3.5 on solar aspects. Some stepping down to ground or early season layer due to mass. Numerous size 3+ observed. Lots of roller balls and wet sluffin on north aspects, but no significant avalanche activity or crownlines could be observed on polars. Heavy wet snow and lots of cake like snow below 2100m. Surprisingly no pillow failures and just storm snow shredding on features below the hut.
toddthetoad,
Wednesday 26th March, 2025 5:00PM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Storm Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 26th, 2025Conditions do not suck at Fairy Meadows
After a natural avalanche cycle Monday, failing on March 19th suncrust on steep unskiable terrain. No slides on skiable terrain where observed on any aspects.
Today, we went out with a very conservative mindset, yet we ski'd north to west aspects in steep (35-40 degree) alpine features. At treeline we ski'd pillows in 50+ degrees with only minor sluffing in 60+ unsupported slopes.
At 2600m we had temperatures at -2c however temperatures where consistent to lower elevations (1700m) with down flow winds off the glaciers.
Tomorrow might be a chill day....
toddthetoad,
Tuesday 25th March, 2025 5:00PM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Storm Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 25th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 24th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 23rd, 202518km
great day skiing big old trees. wind blowing light to moderate out of the east. moderate snow transportation and buffed snow at the ridge top. creamy pow all the way down. small amount of sluffing in the steeper open areas.
adam.rosenfeld13,
Sunday 23rd March, 2025 3:00PM
Gorge
Rode Gorge 15km area Sun Mar 23.
Stormy conditions, heavy snowfall throughout the day. Over 2cm falling per hour
There was about 5-10cm of fresh storm snow that had fallen in the past few hours.
On SE slopes, this storm snow covered a crust.
On NE and NW slopes, there was no crust beneath the storm snow.
NE and NW slopes provided great riding.
We were able to trigger 5-10cm storm slabs by ski cutting convexities on all aspects.
We dug a pit on a NE aspect, 2060m
HS: 320cm
Snow hardness:
-1 fist for 0-30cm
-4 fingers 30cm-50cm
-1 finger 50cm-90cm
-crust at 90cm
-another crust at 120cm
Generally the upper 90cm of the snowpack appeared right-side up.
Compression test:
CTE:
- failure with 5 taps, non-planar break, new storm snow about 10cm deep
CTM:
- failure with 2 taps, resistant planar, 25cm.
- failure with 7 taps, resistant planar, 50cm
CTH:
- failure with 6 taps,, resistant planar, 90cm, on crust
coqstoke,
Sunday 23rd March, 2025 1:00PM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 22nd, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 21st, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 20th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 19th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Wind Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 18th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 17th, 2025Gorge-ous Monday
Some sloughing but snow was stable otherwise. We avoided sunny aspects.
donovan_cavers,
Monday 17th March, 2025 2:00PM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 16th, 2025Mt Tod Size 2
40 cm storm snow from Th/Fri plus wind loading in pockets on leeward terrain
jpskinner,
Sunday 16th March, 2025 1:30PM
Gorge-ous !
Amazing and surprisingly stable conditions! Dug a pit at top of the bowl at 15km of the gorge, no significant failure, even after the 30 taps. First 30cm fluffy powder, than get crumbled in different plane, super solid below and after pulling hard on the column with full body weight it failed at 1m deep. Over 3.20m of snow at that location. Still avoided steep slopes to stay safe, but had lots of fun even on 30°and less slopes. Temperature went a little over 0° after 1pm, but not enough to make the snow wet or heavy. Amazing day despite expectation!
gabryellah.photographie,
Sunday 16th March, 2025 10:00AM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 15th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 14th, 2025Le deep Frisby pow
Day at Frisby. Found untracked terrain from recent storm. Surprisingly little wind effect in open areas. Superb riding in 30 to 60 cm light density snow. We purposely stayed away from steep terrain and areas with overhead avalanche hazard. Mix of good visibility and flat light. Did not see any avalanche activity in areas we rode today.
AVCAN FORECASTER,
Friday 14th March, 2025 3:00PM
4th hole Golf course
Approx 70 cm storm snow in sheltered areas from the past week settling (but not bonding to the snowpack).
Skied North aspect 3mm surface hoar formed from Thursday night temp drop.
Ski pen was 30-40 cm and quite supportive
Settlement and whoompfing above 1650
randallpruden56,
Friday 14th March, 2025 1:00PM
Fairy Meadows
Fairy Meadows Mar 9-14:
During the initial storm the area received 120cm of new snow. After a brief clearing another storm brought another 30 cm. The storm snow settled fairly quickly, and bonded well to the underlying surface. A wind event on Mar 13 created widespread wind slabs though some alpine areas were surprisingly sheltered.
On Mar 10 a party triggered a Size 2 Sr, on a SW aspect at 2350m in the Houdini Needles area, originating out of rocks and stepping down to crust.
We saw evidence of a size 2.5 Na on a NE aspect at 2200m, on the steep ridge south of Outpost Bowl, likely occurred during the Mar 8-9 storm.
On Mar 13 there was natural avalanche activity to size 2.5 on all aspects.
Glaciers were well covered with 300-310 cm on Pioneer Glacier.
falzs,
Thursday 13th March, 2025 11:00PM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs, Wind Slabs.
Published: Mar 13th, 2025Ect
mattdoetsch,
Thursday 13th March, 2025 2:00PM
Too Deep!
Went for a look at The Gorge 15km and got a lot of feedback. Shooting cracks everywhere. We pushed out multiple storm slabs in all sorts of terrain, including dense trees. All slabs were moving on top of last weekends storm. Crowns were 40cm down in most spots.
It’s tough skiing out there. We avoided steep terrain due to extreme reactivity. But struggled to ski through mellow terrain because it was too deep!
Also heard from another group that one of them went for a 20m ride in a size 1 avalanche.
liambrinkley95,
Thursday 13th March, 2025 10:00AM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 12th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 12th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 11th, 2025Gorge storm slab
sammefbh,
Tuesday 11th March, 2025 1:00PM
Maybe moderate?
Walked up km15 at the gorge. Evidence of a size 1 storm slab at the top ridge skiers right in the steeper trees (which we avoided), appeared to be skier triggered recently. First skier in our group triggered a large whumph under skier 2&3s feet while dropping in from the top of the ridge. Dry loose to size 1 in steeper terrain.
Red was old recent size 1 slab. Blue was our line
manuelasistores,
Tuesday 11th March, 2025 12:00PM
Elevators Obs
kamibow,
Tuesday 11th March, 2025 12:00AM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 10th, 2025Triggered cornices
We triggered a cornice first thing in the morning. We are used to this area, we were going to drop our snowboard at the top of the zone. The first sled that parked triggered the whole bowl from the cornice. Depth was maybe 1 foot.
marie.eve.gin,
Monday 10th March, 2025 9:00AM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 9th, 2025North face on Frisby lake side
About 10 to 20 cm of fresh powder on-top of crust layer. Slab size was maybe 40cm
Owen Roes,
Sunday 9th March, 2025 12:00PM
Snowmobile accidental 1.5
taylar3006,
Sunday 9th March, 2025 1:00AM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Storm Slabs, Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 8th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Storm Slabs.
Published: Mar 7th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Storm Slabs.
Published: Mar 6th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 5th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Storm Slabs.
Published: Mar 4th, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 3rd, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 2nd, 2025Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs.
Published: Mar 2nd, 2025Gorge 17k
Afternoon fitness run to summit at 17km. No sloughing observed while in trees along treed spin, horrible skiing conditions at 1200m, marginal coast-like conditions at 1500m. Observed no concerning avalanche conditions. FSR in great condition; however, passed vehicles not using radio.
brent.dewolff,
Sunday 2nd March, 2025 1:00PM
Avalanche Forecast
Problems: Persistent Slabs, Loose Wet.
Published: Mar 1st, 2025snowmobile triggered avalanche
taylar3006,
Saturday 1st March, 2025 4:00PM
Everyone did a rain dance
Rained to the top of 17 and seems like it rained to the top of North Queest as well. Rain crusts on all aspects and all elevations. Isolated pockets of wind slab at ridge top. No signs of avalanche activity.
Skiing was not great. Breakable crust from top to bottom. Lots of activity on the Gorge road. Many loaded logging trucks and several vehicles not calling.
adam.k,
Monday 24th February, 2025 12:00PM
Everyone did a rain dance
Rained to the top of 17 and seems like it rained to the top of North Queest as well. Rain crusts on all aspects and all elevations. Isolated pockets of wind slab at ridge top. No signs of avalanche activity.
Skiing was not great. Breakable crust from top to bottom. Lots of activity on the Gorge road. Many loaded logging trucks and several vehicles not calling.
adam.k,
Monday 24th February, 2025 12:00PM
Pump The Brakes!
Touchy storm slab. Numerous settlements at TL and BTL remoting roadbanks up to 100m away. Day was sunny and warm, top 15cm is moist. Witnessed, few size 1 loose wet in the PM. Avoided avalanche terrain.
leyenmax,
Sunday 23rd February, 2025 5:00PM
SP wind slab
afalts,
Saturday 22nd February, 2025 3:00PM
Salmon lakes avalanche
calvin.mcgillis,
Saturday 22nd February, 2025 10:00AM
Avy forecast spot-on
We rode Gorge 15km and 17km on Feb 16 and Feb 17. Riding conditions were amazing - about 25cm of dry unconsolidated snow made for face shots all weekend!
Avy problems were persistent slab and dry loose, and we saw both of them - thank you forecasters, your report was spot-on!
1. Dry loose - any thing over 35 degrees would produce dry loose with skier trigger. It would run faster and further than we expected. We tried to ride on elevated terrain features and use sluff management to avoid getting caught in this. We also saw multiple natural dry loose likely triggered by tree bombs.
2. Persistent slab - we saw the crown/debris of a size 2 persistent slab avalanche on the NE face of North Queest Mountain. Appears to be natural release. I am unsure when this released. I apologize for poor photo quality, I circled the crowns in red.
coqstoke,
Monday 17th February, 2025 1:00PM
The Gorge
Mild day at 17km temps wise with great skiing conditions! We did see the odd little tree shedding and a couple of very small point releases and roller balls, all which looked to have originated from tree bombs in steep terrain earlier in the day.
The new snow from the weekend was light and unconsolidated on the W through NE aspects we travelled on based on ski feel and a few hand shears. I could pull off a block below the HST and above what I assume was the Jan. 30 SH layer, but only as a non-planar break. Got some very minor sluff on a couple steeper turns but otherwise little to no reactivity.
The more tracked areas were not really filled in and skied kind of firm/crunchy. Areas that were less tracked skied amazing.
T.Mac,
Monday 17th February, 2025 12:00PM
Gorge 17km
Great day at the Gorge!
francis.alexandra,
Monday 17th February, 2025 10:00AM
Sluff Party
Great skiing at the Gorge. Loose dry action to size 1.5 with skier traffic. Sluff sluggish at the start but rapidly entraining mass and becoming a problem if not managed.
vincentjauvin,
Monday 17th February, 2025 12:00AM
Feb 16
Rode lots of trees today. Some wind loaded areas in low spots. Tops of ridges we a little less covered due to winds. Temp was -3 to -5 and snow was very setup on top of an old crust layer.
ythistwo,
Sunday 16th February, 2025 11:00AM
Gorge 15k
Great snow conditions but a small surface crust on steeper south facing slopes
logandriedger,
Saturday 15th February, 2025 11:00AM
Gorge 17
Great day at 17
Stuck mostly to the trees, lots of partly covered tracks from last weekend but still plenty of new lines to be found. Snow felt pretty stable on the north aspect dropping into happy valley. Surface hoar developing
alec4242,
Friday 7th February, 2025 11:59AM
Gorge 20
Awesome day out. There has been tons of wind effect since the latest storm. Cornices starting to develop, Sastrugi on most wind exposed terrain.
Tons of surface hoar development. SH developed on day old tracks (pictured).
We rode the burn and found supportive, wind pressed snow in most areas. At times you would punch through and hit the breakable sun crust. Overall skiing was good.
Day was cold (-16 at car) with a real bite that was softened by the sun. Solar is starting to pack some punch. Sweating and pinwheeling started by midday.
Very little to no signs of instability.
Tons of sledders pushing back deeper than I’ve seen before. Super talented group of sledders were awesome to watch. They were high marking on slopes of every aspect (S&N pictured) and varying grades. Increased confidence in general surface reactivity. Majority of terrain back here has sled tracks on it now - could use more snow!
monasheemonkee,
Friday 7th February, 2025 11:00AM
Brake Check Cutblocks
Widespread crusty conditions on sunny slopes up to 1350m (suspected in higher elevations too)
Dan Kilburn,
Wednesday 5th February, 2025 3:30AM
Gorge 17.5
Snow was light and deep, ~60cm of fresh. The S/SE aspect was relatively stable and we were able to ski some more open/steeper sections. The N/NE was more reactive. We triggered a small isolated soft slab (0.5-1) ski cutting a convex roll and saw evidence of several natural avalanches from the storm cycle.
campusgains,
Tuesday 4th February, 2025 10:00AM
KM 15
Clean roads up. Deep powder with a firm crust about 40cm (varies) under. Triggered a small size 1 slide on an open steep section but no issues from it. Stayed to thicker trees after.
kadenstilling,
Tuesday 4th February, 2025 10:00AM
Frisby Fluff
The easy stuff at Frisby is pretty tracked out, but there is still fun to be had. Spending a day on low-angle slopes and meadows seemed like the right call with all the uncertainty surrounding layers of concern buried in January. We found one of those layers made of feathery surface hoar crystals down 50-55 cm in the snowpack.
AVCAN FORECASTER,
Tuesday 4th February, 2025 2:00AM
DEEP at km 17/15
Skied a couple small knolls btl around the 17km parking lot. Snow was low density and deep. 30-70cm of HS sits on the January drought layer. The new snow was reactive on convex slopes. HN 200cm at 1900m. Noticed a significant number of natural avalanches in steep terrain between S0.5 - 2. Triggered a S0.5 on steeper terrain. Overall skiing was amazing!
mccutcheonj128,
Sunday 2nd February, 2025 12:00AM
DEEP AF
270 cm HS
Storm slab was 75cm deep
1 finger hard at crust
CT had multiple failure layers at
40cm CTE2 RP
50cm CTM11 RP
75cm CTH23 RP
CT was repeated 3x with consistent results.
Three size one natural avalanches were observed in the area but terrain between 20-30 degrees proved stable despite heavy sled traffic.
mitchell.larue,
Saturday 1st February, 2025 12:00PM
Deep Pow
20-60cm of blower powder accumulated throughout treeline and alpine. Wind activity overnight was very evident with sastrugi in the alpine, and deep pockets in the treeline.
mountainsledder87,
Saturday 1st February, 2025 12:00AM
Gorge 15
Widespread natural cycle on almost all steep slopes in the area. These storm slabs ran during the storm and the debris and crowns have 10-15cm covering them now. No fresh naturals were observed and the new snow seems to be bonding well in most places. We ski cut pockets of hang fire and small unsupported test slopes and observed no shooting cracks and very limmited propagation. We did however get Wuhmps and settlement in sheltered areas likely on old SH. Deep trail breaking and almost too much snow to ski mellow slopes.
bensoneff,
Saturday 1st February, 2025 12:00AM
Gorge 16km
Very touchy day at the gorge. From 10km upwards there is visible slabs that came across the road, we followed the grader up as he cleared the road and parking spots where necessary.
The new storm snow is quite heavy and very reactive on the bed surface below. We witnessed multiple 1-1.5 slab avalanches 30-40cm deep in spaced out trees over convexities or steep slopes.
patrickbull97,
Friday 31st January, 2025 10:00AM
Condition report
Gorge 15km. Rode the back side which is facing South. Variable condition. Wind affected and crunchy. Sun affected areas were choppy and hard. Shades areas were pow pow.
We then skied the chute off the front, North aspect. Pretty rough skiing. The trees below were decent.
The picture shows South aspect sun baking the snow.
Also, snow bikes. C’mon guys. The skin track was destroyed. And you rode 100m above us (obviously didn’t know we were there) super dangerous as we were on the slope below.
danielrswayze,
Sunday 26th January, 2025 9:00AM
Groundhog
Good skiing in sheltered terrain.
Aaron Cooperman,
Saturday 25th January, 2025 9:00PM
Good day out.
Great day out in the Gorge, lots of folks and friends in the parking lots!
Much colder than forecast. Air temp @ 2000m -15 with a sudden plummet at ridge top. Fog and moisture in valley made for a nippy cold.
Sun Crust and Wind Skin galore throughout the area. Tree bombs are crusty and make for variable skiing in lots of areas. Northerly aspects have a wind pressed breakable crust on top and skied kinda not great.
E/SE aspects skied the best, powder and face shots to be had.
monasheemonkee,
Saturday 25th January, 2025 11:30AM
Gorge km15
AnnaFoley,
Wednesday 22nd January, 2025 1:30PM
Sun peaks slack country
Came across two separate glide cracks in separate terrain features in the sun peaks backcountry. Cracks essentially spanned the entire open slope in both cases- approx 150-200m across. Snow pack was relatively thin (1.1m) and the cracks were as wide as 4m in some places. Both slopes were predominately east facing 35 degree slopes at about 1900m with grassy alpine terrain underlying the snow pack.
paulcampsall,
Sunday 19th January, 2025 1:00PM
Beautiful day at the Gorge
Had a great day touring the gorge. Didn’t see much any evidence of recent avalanche and the conditions were great. Was reviewing some GoPro footage and discovered I triggered a small size 1. Didn’t notice at the time of riding. Broke right below me as I was making a turn but rode over it and continued down the slope toward my riding partners. When I regrouped I noticed a bit of slough coming down but no significant debris.
mkryan1989,
Sunday 19th January, 2025 10:00AM
Sure why not
good snow in sheltered areas, though the tree bombs are real. Wind affected in open area. Surface Hoar to alpine in sheltered areas. Thin sun crust on open solar aspects. our one hand pit had a hard resistant brake down 20cm on a crust. We had one settlement at ridge top. Sun in the morning and clouds rolling through all afternoon. -8 at the truck (1600m) in the morning and -5 in the afternoon.
adrian451,
Saturday 18th January, 2025 3:00PM