I expect more dangerous avalanches today.
Overnight temps last night (this morning) are ridiculously warm and we may yet again break records for high temps today. This is only adding more melt water down into the snowpack, weakening and loosening the bonds holding the snow onto the slopes.
These are strange times - dealing with an unusually cranky snowpack for so late in the season and subjecting it to sustained, blistering heat and record-breaking temperatures. The melt-freeze cycle in general provides a stabilizing influence on the snowpack, but once you lose the "freeze" part of the cycle, frightful things begin to happen, particularly when the sun is beating down on the mountains during the day and you have a conditionally unstable, layered, "cranky" snowpack. The melt-water now starts to potentially pool along structural interfaces, dissolve the bonds holding the snow together, and, well, initiate avalanches.
BIG PICTURE: I am worried about the wet avalanche conditions this weekend. Some of the concerns are below.
- Wet Loose avalanches are likely on all aspects and elevations and may subsequently trigger wet slabs below.
- Wet Slab avalanches are probable on many aspects and elevations and perhaps most likely on steep northeast to southeast facing aspects. Crown depths may be 1-3' with very wide propagation.
- Cornices are sagging and may calve off in this heat, triggering avalanches below.
- Glide avalanches are likely in Stairs Gulch, Broads, and Mill B South of Big Cottonwood Canyon. These are drainages to avoid this weekend and early next week.
Remember that wet avalanche debris sets up immediately like concrete and difficult to excavate an avalanche victim. Glide avalanches are large and full depth and rarely survivable.
Travel Advice: Avoid avalanche paths; avoid runout zones.
