Avalanche bulletin and weather forecast Haute Savoie

This avalanche translation of the Meteo France avalanche bulletin is produced mainly through an automated translation tool.  Please use it in conjunction with the French bulletin found at the above link.

N74250311
SNOW AND AVALANCHE BULLETIN FOR HAUTE SAVOIE
(VALID OUT OF OPEN AND MARKED RUNS)
PREPARED ON TUESDAY 25 MARCH
FOR WEDNESDAY 26 MARCH

ESTIMATE OF RISK UNTIL WEDNESDAY EVENING:
All massive Haute-Savoie:
Higher than 2000 m: marked risk (level 3)
Lower than 2000 mm limited risk (level 2)

WEATHER OVERVIEW UNTIL WEDNESDAY EVENING:
Cloudy night from Tuesday to Wednesday and Wednesday early morning and then pretty nice periods of sunshine in a sweet atmosphere.
Temperatures planned to 1500 m 2 to -8 (shadow).

Isothermal 0 1500 m.
Wind around 2000 m: low.
Wind around 4000 m: Northwest 100 km / h decreasing 50 mph and turning west Wednesday afternoon.

SNOW CONDITIONS:
They become very good for a late March, circa 1000 m there are 20 to 55 cm, circa 1500 m to 80 cm of snow total 1m35. It is white until at very low altitude.
This is an opportunity to make departures skis or snowshoes to toe when 1000/1200 m, paying attention to the rocks and other obstacles barely hidden.

Quality of snow for Wednesday: often still of good powder, but that will grow fast enough under the influence of the sun. Around the mid-mountain peaks, snow is blown and wavy, or a thin layer of powdery snow covering very hard, even icy. Large mountain slopes exposed to the northwest are also in compacted snow.

STABILITY OF SNOW COVER:
Some localized accumulations fragile and departures heating.
For two weeks, the episodes have succeeded disturbed, the most important being that of Friday, March 21 accompanied by stormy winds from the west to southwest. This Tuesday morning, the snow was 20/30 cm since 1000 m (lower layers in the MT-Blanc), the wind was blowing northwest storm last night.
The snowpack is still moderately to weakly bonded, we should avoid steep slopes near the passes and peaks and slopes failures as the risk remains important to break a slab to a depth sometimes close to 1m. Wednesday under the influence of the sun (caution north), those risks will gradually decline or even disappear in mid mountain. At the opposite, in the corridors and walls, the heat will result in purges (in the morning between east and south), which may give some fairly large avalanches (as in Aravis). Although thus take into account the risks for a hike even on a plateau but with steep slopes nearby. Beware also cornices, some are already fractured into 2000/2500 m.

TREND LATER RISK:
A new layer of snow is expected overnight Wednesday to Thursday (20 cm to 2000 m).
The risks are expected to remain stationary.

Meteo-France updates this newsletter everyday at 16h or sooner if conditions warrant nivométéorologiques.