Greg mentioned yesterday in his observation, "Wind-drifting was the player," and that remains true today as well. Strong winds over the past 24 hours have created sensitive soft slabs of wind-drifted snow at the mid and upper elevations. Today, wind-drifted snow avalanches will be stiffer than earlier in the storm and may start to break above you.

While this issue will be of highest concern at the upper elevations, exposed ridge-tops below 9,500 feet may still have areas of wind-drifted snow. The drifted snow will be most prevalent on aspects facing northwest, through north, to east, and south, due to the elevated southwest winds over the past few days. However, between the days of high winds and the shift in wind direction this morning, this problem can be found on all aspects at mid and upper elevations for the time being. Avalanches involving wind-drifted snow may reach depths of over 2 feet and widths of up to 150 feet.

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Sensitive cornices can be found along many exposed ridgelines at the mid and upper elevations. Avoid traveling on or below corniced ridgelines, as a cornice collapse could trigger a new or wind-drifted snow avalanche.

While the new snow should begin to rapidly settle out moving into the drier weather in the coming days, storm totals still remain high and temperatures remain low this morning. For that reason, triggering an avalanche involving sluffing or soft slabs of new snow is possible on all steep slopes outside of the wind zone. In the past week, the highest concentration of avalanches has been on the upper and mid-elevation northeast-facing terrain, along with reports of small grain facets atop a melt-freeze crust. These north and east-facing slopes are the places I would be cautious of, especially in terrain over 35° in steepness, both in and out of the wind zone.

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