[MCR] Hector Lake Area, Rockies

Spent the day skiing around treeline in the Hector Lake area.  Steady snow throughout the day brought the recent storm snow up to 35-40cm which made for excellent ski quality throughout the day but deteriorating avalanche conditions.

 

We had one skier remote size 1.5 avalanche on a thin and variable sun crust down 35-40cm on a steep southerly aspect from about 20m away at 2300m, and cracking and soft slabs failing on steeper rolls on Southerly aspects.  On the N aspects there was some power sluffing in steeper terrain but no slab failures that we noticed.  Some light wind effect at treeline to watch for as well.

 

Throughout the course of the day we also observed and heard several large cornice failures coming out of steep unskiable NE facing terrain in the alpine and saw one natural size 2 slab fail on an East aspect at treeline, also in very steep unsupported terrain.  I suspect the wind was moving the snow around up high fairly well.

We stuck to moderate angled, well supported terrain with little overhead hazard and had a fun day of skiing!

 

Cheers, Conrad Janzen
ACMG/IFMGA Mountain Guide
www.banffmountainguides.com

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