Avalanche Advisory
Advisory: Skyline Area Mountains Issued by Brett Kobernik for Monday - February 20, 2017 - 6:21am
bottom line

The majority of the terrain has a LOW avalanche danger today. Watch for "pockety" areas of fresh wind drifted snow along the higher ridges. Natural avalanches are quite unlikely but there's a slight chance a person might find a small wind slab to release.
current conditions

The under producing storm did drop a few more inches of snow over the last 24 hours. This brings totals since Thursday up to 5 or 6 inches. Westerly wind is in the moderate speed category along the ridges and looks light below the exposed terrain. Overnight temperatures dipped into the mid 20s.

On Saturday, I noticed that the new snow has been blown around a bit. I did not find any of the fresh drifts to be sensitive. On the more northerly facing slopes, there is some weak snow that formed on the surface last week. This is now buried and could act as a weak layer. The good news is it doesn't appear to be all that weak and we haven't added a huge new snow load to it. I'm not anticipating it being a big issue but I will continue to evaluate it during the upcoming days.
Avalanche Problem 1
type aspect/elevation characteristics
LIKELIHOOD
LIKELY
UNLIKELY
SIZE
LARGE
SMALL
TREND
INCREASING DANGER
SAME
DECREASING DANGER
over the next 24 hours
description

Fresh areas of wind drifted snow would be the only spots you could find trouble today. I think it's fairly unlikely that someone will trigger anything significant. Pay attention to any cracking as you travel along the higher terrain.
weather

We're going to see partly cloudy skies today with a slight chance of snow showers. No significant accumulation is expected. Ridgetop temperatures will be in the mid 30s. West southwest wind will be slightly gusty this morning and slow just a bit later. The longer term forecast looks fairly active with a decent storm shaping up for mid week and different systems moving through the 10 day weather model output.
general announcements

We will publish full detailed advisories Saturday and Sunday mornings by 7am. We will also be publishing basic avalanche danger ratings & info during the week.

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