Mountain Conditions Summary – Rockies and Interior Ranges
Issued: Thursday, September 27, 2007
A cool and generally unstable past week of weather in the mountains, with a mix of blue sky, cloudy days and overnight lows down to -6 in Jasper. Winter appears firmly entrenched in the high elevations now, with over half a meter of new snow deposited as of Monday (24th). Not much additional snow since then - but no melting also.
Reports from the Bugaboos of 30-60 cm of settled snow on the glaciers, with most of the rock climbing now done for the year – perhaps there might be some hope for the low elevation south facing rocks to dry off, but that’s not a good bet. Consider the place done for the season, unless you’re sharpening your tools. Could the ice hose be forming?
A flight through the Lake Louise area today confirmed the same thing, with lots of snow in the alpine and no apparent melting over the past week. The best bet for any technical alpine climbing right now would be to hunt for ice runnels, which are just starting to form up in the gullies. If the cold weather persists and we get another clear spell, then October might offer some interesting mixed possibilities.
Glacier travel ok in all areas with a settled snowcover to walk on, but the hunt for crevasses has become quite challenging. This is a tough time of year to navigate crevasses, when they become bridged enough to be hidden but not enough to support body weight. Keep alert for isolated pockets of windslab that form after fresh snow and wind.
The east side of the Rockies looks good and dry for rock climbing in the sun. Yamnuska, EEOR and similar cliffs are dry – although north facing cliffs at the same elevation still hold snow.
The forecast for the next few days is poor. For Friday, a rainfall warning is in effect for the western areas (Revelstoke), and rain/snow in store for areas as far east as Banff. Saturday looks better, but still a mostly unstable weekend ahead. It’s a strong SW flow, and so the best bet for weather will be the eastern ranges, where it should be mostly dry and probably very windy. Highs of 10-15 degrees expected.
Overall – not great conditions and not a great forecast either. I’ll call cragging, hiking or rock climbing on the leeward sides of the mountains as the best bet this weekend.
Grant Statham
Mountain Guide