December 16, 2017

    AVALANCHE ACTIVITY:

    No new avalanches observed in the immediate area.



     YESTERDAY:

    Nice to see some cooler temps in the alpine.

    Visibility, tough mid mountain at times. The low level cloud seemed to have smoke in it.

    Fresh snow from early Friday, ideal conditions for frost in the trees.

    Just before sunset, hole at the end of the tunnel.


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

2180 meters    -10, Winds were 15-25 KPH SSW--Whistler Peak
1835 meters      -7, Winds were 10-20 KPH SW--Roundhouse
1660 meters      -7, 3 cm of new, 3 cm in 24 hrs  Base 139 cm --Pig Alley

  660 meters      -2, Valley Temp, Max Temp Yesterday was +2.8, 2.4 mm of precip recorded yest

    As of 07:00 hrs this am we have overcast skies and unlimited visibility.


FORECAST:

Unsettled this morning before a weak warm front pushes through today into Sunday. The upper flow is Northwesterly this am, switching to Westerly later today. The FL will begin to climb to around 1000 meters tonight and max out at around 1500 tomorrow afternoon. A cold front will trail this non producer with cooling temperatures and decent snowfall Monday night into Tuesday. Hopefully this active front with a fairly deep low will track over the area with a much needed dump. Unfortunately, the upper ridge will return for Wednesday into Friday. There is a chance the low will dip south, difficult to really say how much we will get until Monday.
Guesstimates: Trace-2 cm by Sunday morning, 4-8 cm by Monday morning, 10-20 cm by Tuesday morning, 20-40 cm by Wednesday morning.

    GOES IR image from this am.

    Northwesterly flow aloft will switch to Westerly this afternoon.

    Warm Westerly flow this afternoon.

     Rex Block with the lows to the North and South of the High on Sunday.





    INFORMATION & OBSERVATIONS:

    Interesting choice!

    Some fresh snow, even the raven was unhappy with the moist cold weather on Friday afternoon.

    Great breaks at times yesterday.

Observations from Sam McKoy through Mountain Conditions Report:

Rohr Lake Area

Spent 3 days (Dec 13-15) camped below Rohr Lake. Conditions varied widely.

Surface facetting made for decent skiing in sheltered troughs and shaded low lying areas which exceeded expectations. Most other surfaces had been affected by warm temperatures and included breakable crust or windpressed.

Evidence of one isolated size 2-2.5 on a SE aspect near Cayoosh that might have occurred in the warming temperatures down ~30-45 on the late November Crust. No other signs of instability.

Snowpack for us ranged from 1.5 at treeline and up to 2.5 meters in sheltered alpine areas.

No test results. Heavily consolidated and hard snowpack. In 1.5m test pits, the late November crust was buried down ~35cm with the Halloween crust down ~65cm.

A few new centimetres of new snow the morning of the 15th and more falling as we were leaving the mountains. The bond to the old surfaces will remain questionable and surface instabilities may be the reigning concern in future days.

Avalanche Canada MIN Report: Duffy Lake Road

ARTICLES:

Heuristic Traps: Andrew McLean

Early snowfall brings avalanche warning  for Alp Ski Resorts: The Times

No trace of 5 soldiers caught in avalanches: Northern India