Turnagain Pass

After an action-packed weekend of heavy rain, strong wind and large avalanches, yesterday was a relatively quiet day on Turnagain Pass. With the end of the weekend’s storms came a quick end to the resulting and impressive avalanche cycle. Check out photos of the aftermath on our observation page; including Tim Glassett’s photos from the AKDOT&PF.

A cold front moved through yesterday evening and has begun to freeze and lock-up the snowpack. The very wet snow, which extended to ~2,000′, will likely have a semi-supportable to supportable crust today. As one travels above 2,000′, where the snow was dense and damp, the surface crust should slowly disappear and give way to drier snow and improved riding conditions at the higher elevations. 

There is a high uncertainty as to the state of the snowpack following the weekend’s ‘melt-down’ and a shift to colder temperatures freezing it into place. A conservative mind-set will be good in you are headed into the mountains. That said, primary avalanche concerns will be associated with lingering wet snow and deep slab instabilities. Weather today is not expected to add to the avalanche danger as only 1-2″ of new snow is forecast along with light Westerly winds. However, sunlit slopes may see enough warmth to soften Southern aspects and trigger wet sluffs. Primary instabilities include:

WET AVALANCHES:
In areas that still harbor wet snow, or just a shallow surface re-freeze over punchy saturated snow, large wet slab and wet loose avalanches are still possible. Additonally, sunshine today may increase this likelihood on Southerly slopes. Wet avalanches could be bigger than expected and entrain significant amounts of heavy debris on steep sustained slopes. Steering clear of steep, 40 degree and greater, slopes with soft and saturated snow will be wise.

DEEP SLAB:
At elevations above 2,500′ there has been 3-8′ of storm snow from the middle part of April that sits on a variety of old weak layers. Much of the past avalanche activity is suspected to have occurred within these old layers. Now that they are buried so deep in pack, human triggering is not likely, but still something that should be on your radar. Shallow snowpack zones, such as those South of the Pass are the most suspect.

WIND SLAB:
Lingering wind slabs from the weekend’s storms may still be found at the upper elevations. These could be anywhere from 1-5+’ thick.. Again there is a high degree of uncertainty as to how the upper elevations have faired in this respect. Watching for wind textured snow and cracking in the snow around you will be ways of looking for shallow slabs. The deeper wind slabs are more difficult as they likely won’t display signs before releasing.

Photo below is of the very wet and saturated snow from yesterday – which is now freezing into place!