May 16, 2017

    AVALANCHE ACTIVITY:

    Cornice control on chainsaw ridge yesterday.

    Debris from Sunset Cornice Blast.


    YESTERDAY:

    Obscured mid mountain Monday morning May 15, 2016.

    Snowing lightly at 1860 meters 11:30 Hours.

    At times you could see across the valley.

    07:15 Hrs Monday morning.

    Just above the mid layer cloud.

    Big picture Monday afternoon.

    Light snow at 16:30 Hours.

    17:30 hours with drier conditions.



Weather Observations for May 16, 2017 taken at 06:00 Hours.

2240 meters      -6, Winds were 10-25 KPH E--Horstman Hut 
1860 meters      -3, Winds were     0-5 KPH S--Rendevous
1550 meters      -2, 2 cm of new snow, 3 cm in 24 hrs, 221 cm Base, RH 98%  --Catskinner 

  660 meters     +2, Valley Temp, Max Temp Yesterday was +8.3, 0.9 mm of Precip recorded yest

1.7 mm of precip recorded at 1550 meters over night.

    As of 07:00 Hrs this am we have overcast skies and variable visibility.


FORECAST:

The cold upper level low is moving Southeast into Washington state this morning bringing overcast conditions in a Southwesterly flow aloft. The flow will slowly switch to Northerly later in the day as the ridge begins to slowly move into our zone. For today we can expect overcast skies with the chance of some isolated intermittent showers with the FL rising to 2200 meters by this afternoon, then dropping to  2000 meters this evening. Wednesday will be unsettled with sunny skies in the am with convective cloud development by the afternoon with the slight chance of some showers. The Fl tomorrow will rise to 2300+ meters as we finally get some warm spring weather. Unsettled weather will stick around for a few days as the ridge remains weak, with a little instability giving us cloud development and the chance of isolated showers.  The ridge will strengthen by Saturday with mostly sunny skies. The high pressure appears to stick around into next week for a well deserved break in the lows out of the Gulf of Alaska. The FL is expected to be well above 3000 meters by Monday.

Guesstimates: trace-1 cm in the alpine, 1-2 mm below by Wednesday morning, trace-2 mm by Thursday morning, trace-1 mm by Friday morning.

    GOES IR image for this am.

     Low still affecting us for today.

    Low swings out of our zone by Wednesday. Weak ridging begins.

    Strong upper level low exiting the area.

    High pressure will slowly build into the weekend.

    High will bring weather change by tomorrow morning.

    Looks like an Omega Block (Click for definition) will bring us nice weather into next week.


OBSERVATIONS & INFORMATION:

    Some fresh snow at 1860 meters.

    Flat light for most of the day.

    Evening shift departing!

    Still snow on the lower section of the bike park.


ARTICLES:

Stevens Pass Avalanche Advisory: Northwest Avalanche Center

Western Washington Weather Advisory: More Winter Weather

Arcteryx Voltair 20 Airbag backpack review: Wildsnow.com

National Parks Avalanche Advisory: Spring Conditions

December 2016 Quick Draw Express Lift Incident: Granby Resort Ski Area