A bump in winds overnight created a fresh round of drifts that'll react to our additional weight. Found mostly on the leeward side of upper elevation ridges, you'll also want to be on the lookout for cross-loaded terrain like chutes and gullies. In either case, it's an easy and mostly manageable avalanche problem to avoid... simply steer clear of any fat, rounded piece of snow, particularly if it sounds hollow like a drum. And remember... our snowpack is super shallow and triggering even a small slide can take you for a body-bruising ride through rocks and stumps barely hidden under the thin snowpack.

Last weeks high and dry weather created a layer of weak surface snow or what we call near surface facets. In the short term it's loud, recrystallized powder and good riding. In the long term it turns into a headache, especially once its buried, because it becomes the next problem child in the snowpack. And that's exactly our setup right now as Saturday's storm snow buried and preserved this weakness. This becomes a potentially tricky scenario, especially as we add additional weight to our developing snowpack. Think about an upside-down cake or stronger snow on weaker snow. Look for signs of unstable snow like loud whoomping sounds and sudden collapses of the snowpack or shooting cracks in front of your skis, board, or sled. As today's storm materializes, you'll want to be aware of changing weather conditions especially if we stack up more snow than forecast or if winds are stronger than anticipated. By days end, avalanches may break wider and deeper than you might expect.