Turnagain Pass Avalanche Forecast

We’ve seen 2 new glide cracks ‘pop’ in the last 24 hours, and several others in the past week.  Though incredibly unpredictable as to when these cracks may avalanche, we have noticed that some cracks are growing in size and are showing their ugly faces once again, allowing us to map them out and plan travel accordingly.  It’s an easy avalanche problem to mitigate; simply avoiding time spent exposed under these yawning cracks.  Though the probability of tangling with a glide in motion is low, the consequences will be fatal if you are in the wrong spot at that moment when stress overcomes strength and a glide crack turns into a glide avalanche.

If you’re a daily reader of this advisory you’ll notice this is the 61^st day in a row where we’ve made mention of glide avalanches, unfortunately there is no end in sight.  It’s been an unusual season in this respect and as the old-timers say; unusual conditions breed unusual avalanches.

An unmistakable example of the avalanche problem we are dealing with reared it’s head yesterday morning, just outside of the motorized parking lot (East face of Seattle ridge).  The crown on this full-depth glide avalanche is easily 10 feet deep.

Oblique view of the same glide as above, looking south toward Johnson Pass and Lynx creek.

Shallow wind slabs (6-10”) were proving reactive to skiers on Sunday after a bump in Easterly winds Saturday.  With another slight bump yesterday (gusting to the mid-30’s mph on Sunburst), we could continue to see some shallow wind slab activity in the upper elevations.  Key in to any cracking, wind-textured or stiffer surfaces to suss out a wind slab.  No consequence test slopes will be a valuable tool today to get a better idea of reactivity and average depth of wind slab we’re dealing with.

Loose snow:

Loose snow sluffing will warrant management today if skiing the steeps.  Sluffs have been reported to be fast moving with the ability to entrain a significant amount of surface snow in big terrain.  This will be more pronounced on cooler, shadier North aspects.

Listen to your Mother’s voice in your head and “stay away from the edge.”  Take her advice and double it to give yourself a wider berth than you AND your Mother think necessary.  Furthermore, be very wary of spending time beneath cornices.  A group yesterday heard/ witnessed a large cornice failure off the S face of Kickstep during the heat of the day (2:30pm).  These are becoming larger and weaker, ebbing closer to the point of failure as we move in to Spring.