Mountain temperatures will climb a few degrees higher than yesterday into the 60s °F. The window for safe and supportable travel is small this morning following a poor overnight refreeze. As the sun rises and temperatures begin to warm, superficial crusts will melt away, and you can expect to trigger wet-loose avalanches that, although they will likely start small, can gouge down, pick up speed, and entrain a significant amount of debris.

The greater concern is the potential for wet slabs. The likelihood of these slabs increases through the day as the snowpack warms and meltwater begins moving through it. Wet slabs are much more destructive and difficult to manage than wet-loose avalanches; they can break deep and wide without clear warning signs. When meltwater percolates into the snowpack, it pools on buried crusts or faceted layers, weakening bonds and resulting in avalanches several feet thick.

There is a high amount of variability and uncertainty in predicting wet slabs. Give yourself a wide safety margin to handle this uncertainty by choosing conservative terrain, avoiding travel on and beneath steep slopes, and planning an early exit from the mountains well before the heat of the day.

Wet slabs are notoriously difficult to predict, but all the ingredients are present for them to occur: meltwater, a slab, and faceted snow. Learn more about predicting wet slabs HERE.

Additional wet-snow problems:

• Glide avalanches: These have been occurring as recently as last Friday in Broads Fork (Observation HERE). These full-depth, destructive slides are difficult to forecast. It’s worth avoiding areas where the snowpack exists above smooth ground vegetation or smooth rock slabs, such as Stairs, Broads Fork, and Mill B south of Big Cottonwood Canyon, as well as the Porter Slabs in upper Porter Fork in Mill Creek.

• Cornices: Warm temperatures cause cornices to slump and bend, eventually falling off the ridgeline naturally in the spring. Avoid traveling on or beneath ridgelines where cornices hang overhead.