Avalanche Forecast
Avalanche Forecasts are for use by experienced backcountry travelers in uncontrolled sidecountry and backcountry terrain. These forecasts and conditions do not apply to open, in-bounds terrain at ski resorts, which is subject to avalanche control by local resort ski patrol.
Avalanche Rating
Considerable (3)
Not all wind slabs are created equal. Many recent avalanche reports point to a failure layer of surface hoar that will keep slabs reacting to human triggers for longer than you might expect.
More Detail
To get the complete forecast with additional graphics and details, please view the Avalanche Canada Zone forecast provided by Avalanche Canada.
Snowpack Discussion
Saturday's moderate northwest wind has affected the surface in open areas at all elevations.
In sheltered terrain, 30 to 40 cm of settling snow sits on a layer of weak, feathery surface hoar crystals, possibly even into the alpine. On sunny slopes, there may be a crust as well.
A crust/facet/surface hoar layer buried in early December may be found 90 to 160 cm deep.
Avalanche Activity
On Monday, a snowcat west of Revelstoke triggered a small slab which failed on the early December weak layer. It was at treeline on a west aspect.
We also have a report of a very large (size 3) wind slab avalanche triggered by a skier in neighbouring Glacier National Park.
On Saturday there were numerous, small accidentally triggered wind slab avalanches. A newer layer of surface hoar was noted as the failure plane.