Monashee Chalet near Blue River had a well settled snowpack with an Hs
hovering at around 245cm. 10 cm fell during this 5 day week, but we had the
good fortune of working with 30cm of storm snow that fell the week previous.
We rated the avalanche danger as moderate BTL and at TL during the week. At
lower elevations ( below 5500ft), a thin temperature crust was present down
30 cm, and just below it down 40cm, there was surface hoar size 20-30mm.
This surface hoar is present across the province and was buried on Feb 4th
in many locations. We were only able to get moderate compression test
results on it most times we looked, but it was reactive to skier weight on
steep rolls in some boulder piles below 5500ft near Finn Creek. Our group
could trigger some of the small features off boulders down 40cm remotely on
a SE aspect. The only other areas of concern were sluffing of the surface
snow on steep shady areas at all aspects and elevations, and some mid day
destabilizing of the surface snow when the sun came out on Sunday the 11th.
We saw no evidence of avalanche activity on the Jan 22 surface hoar and you
have to dig down 130 to 150 to locate it.
Cheers,
Steve Ludwig ACMG Ski Guide
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