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Forecast for the Skyline Area Mountains

Brett Kobernik
Issued by Brett Kobernik on
Saturday morning, January 6, 2018

The avalanche danger is LOW. The avalanche danger will be increasing late today and tonight as the storm moves in and adds snow on our weak snowpack. By Sunday morning, the avalanche danger will most likely be in the MODERATE to CONSIDERABLE range.

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Weather and Snow

Avalanche conditions have been mostly stable. The stretch of dry weather continued all week long. This period continued to weaken our already weak, shallow snowpack. This is bad news. The current weak snow is almost certain to cause avalanches when we start stacking more snow on top of it. Furthermore, it will most likely haunt us for a long time unless there is a big turnaround of some sort.

LINK TO YOUTUBE VIDEO OF SLAB RELEASING IN A TEST

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Avalanche Problem #1
Persistent Weak Layer
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Description

The weak snow that is currently on the ground is our biggest concern. Not so much for today because there isn't a new load on top of it yet. The southwest wind might stir things up a bit but there really isn't much snow available for transporting into fresh drifts from the southerly facing slopes. The current weak snow will be more of an issue after tonights storm as well as after the next storm mid week.

Additional Information

A storm system will move through later today into tonight. We'll see partly cloudy skies with light snow flurries possible starting mid day. High temperatures will be around freezing. Southwest wind will increase to the moderate to strong range and switch northwest and decrease as the storm moves through tonight. Most of the snow will be this afternoon until about midnight. Temperatures are not real cold with this system, only in the 20s so I anticipate moderate density snow. I'm thinking we'll see 4 to 7 inches from this little event. A larger storm is shaping up for mid week, stay tuned!

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