[MCR] Albert Icefield area - Selkirk Mts

[Public Mountain Conditions Report]

The Canadian Mountain and Ski Guide Program conducted a Ski Guide Exam at
Selkirk Lodge April 11-19. What follows is a summary of relevant
conditions the team encountered.

Weather: The week's weather can best be summarized as typical Spring
variability.
The week started cold and clear with strong solar influence that started
to create some great spring corn conditions on southerly aspects while
preserving powder skiing on high northerly slopes. Mid-week the
high-pressure was replaced by a few days of warmer conditions, convective
spring snow storms that deposited 10-20cm of snow, occasional bursts of
intense sun and poor overnight freezes. Freezing levels were between
1600-1900m most of the middle of the week, with moist snow developing to
mountain tops / 2600m on solar aspects and 2200m on northerly aspects. On
the 18th a more substantial storm deposited 20 cm of light snow with
Moderate Westerly winds overnight and into the morning of the 19th. The
week ended as it had begun - with a ridge of high-pressure and cold clear
conditions.

Snowpack: In general this region of the Selkirks continues to have a
well-settled snowpack above 2000m with surface instabilities settling
rapidly with warm temperatures.  Greater concern for solar aspects - and
the affect of the sun on the snowpack on warm days - were themes of the
week.

Surface: 30 cm of snow from the week can be found above treeline / 2000m
and is settling rapidly with warm temperatures. Wind affect, wind ripples
and isolated wind slabs exist at ridgetop and Alpine features from the
moderate Westerly wind on the 19th. A variety of Melt/Freeze crusts exist
on all aspects up to 2200m and sun crusts are present on solar aspects to
mountain top / 2600m. Below 2000m the top 30-50cm of the snow pack was
turning isothermal - which is a type of wet snow that kind of resembles a
slurpee.
Mid-pack: The mid snowpack is well settled on northerly aspects and has a
series of buried sun crusts on solar aspects. A couple of sun-crusts
produced resistant hard test results down 50 and 90-110cm or no results.
Low-pack: Deeper persistent layers exist but were dormant at the time of
the exam. Concern for these layers is most notable in shallow snow pack
regions.

Avalanche Observations:  We observed no significant Slab avalanches during
the week. We did observe widespread wet loose snow from intense sun early
in the week from steep solar aspects which tapered off mid-week with
increased cloud cover.  2 small wind slabs were ski cut in isolated
southerly ridge features mid-week from a period of reverse loading from
Northerly winds. Numerous loose / dry small avalanches were observed on
the 18th from 20cm of snow and one wind slab from steep unsupported
terrain on the morning of the 19th.

Areas that we avoided
Heavily crevassed areas of the Justice Glacier - including some areas that
have been standard ski lines on other years but this year continue to have
visible open crevasses and saggy snow bridges.
Cornice exposed areas. These are more prevalent on the NE ridges.
Shallow snowpack areas where we had a concern for triggering large
destructive avalanches on the persistent weak layers.

Areas that we skied
We found excellent ski conditions all week and skied most standard alpine
bowls, glaciated and TL ski lines in the Selkirk Lodge Tenure - and a few
steeper alpine features up to 50 degrees. The best skiing continued to be
found on northerly alpine features above 2000m. However, southerly aspects
also presented some great ski conditions when skied at the right time.


Cecelia Mortenson


ACMG Alpine and Apprentice Ski Guide
CAA L2


via

Peter Tucker
Executive Director
B: +1.403.949.3587
M: +1.403.689.4324
ed at acmg.ca  |  www.acmg.ca