Author: Jeffrey McCabe

Avalanche releases, fractures, settling noises: clear signals of alarm. Fresh snowdrifts in steep terrain need to be circumvented. Our prior assessment of a delicate situation regionally for winter sports enthusiasts was confirmed today, 29.12. We received repeated reports of mostly medium-sized, in isolated cases also large-sized naturally triggered avalanches. In addition, slab avalanches were triggered…

Cold, loose powder generating highly trigger-sensitive weak layer for fresh snowdrifts. As a supplement to our last blog, a short notice to all winter sports enthusiasts: the Christmas holidays were marked by high quality powder. That is now over. In the interim, winds have increased in general, including distant from high peaks and distant from typical…

Intensifying snowdrift problem at higher altitudes Since Monday (21.12), quite strong westerly winds have been blowing at high altitudes, generating new snow transport. The fresh snowdrift accumulations are currently (23.12) prone to triggering particularly above about 2400 m. This borderline will descend when a cold front strikes on 24-25 December. Snow plumes at about 2900…

In North Tirol, a treacherous old-snow problem regionally, particularly on north-facing slopes above approximately 2200 m Avalanches in the last few days involving people, together with our own snowpack analysis, confirm a quite treacherous old-snow problem in some regions. It is most pronounced in the northwestern regions of North Tirol where there has been little…

 Rigorously circumvent fresh drifts in steep terrain During a night of clear skies on Thursday/Friday (10-11 December) surface hoar formed on the snowpack in widespread areas of Tirol. This now lurks atop an already cold, loosely-packed snow surface, at least in the major areas of precipitation, since wind impact terminated during the last phase of…

Glide-snow problem on grassy slopes. Caution: rooftop avalanches. Let’s first look at the regions where precipitation has been heaviest. There have been record-breaking amounts of fresh snow registered since Friday, 4 December. Record-setting precipitation in Lienz (measurements since 1880) Since Tirol’s Avalanche Warning Service was established in 1960, there have never been such masses of…

 Right off the bat: an appeal to all winter sports enthusiasts Quite deliberately we want the focus at the beginning of this blog to be on the regions of North Tirol where there is little snow. That is where winter sports enthusiasts need to be aware of a potential, difficult-to-assess old-snow problem. The old-snow problem…

In East Tirol a dangerous situation has developed as a consequence of extraordinary amounts of snowfall plus ongoing wind impact and rain. This has led to the highest rank of risk being assigned: very high avalanche danger. Update from 06.12.2020 8:00 am: In the EUREGIO very high avalanche danger prevails regionally. In the mountains there,…

Immense amounts of fresh snow, storm winds, variable snowfall altitudes The ZAMG forecasts have been confirmed: in southern regions it will snow intensively. In East Tirol the expectations are currently for 50 cm of fresh snow on the valley floors (with significant proportion of rainfall), elsewhere generally 100 cm. In the upper Gailtal/Lesachtal, according to…

 November concludes very mild, not much precipitation  The month of November 2020 will go down in history: according to ZAMG Weather Service it was among the ten driest, in the mountains the third warmest, and among the five sunniest Novembers in the entire history of weather measurement. December launch – heavy snowfall in southern regions …