Conditions Report: Dukes of Hazards

December 14, 2023

Sledding conditions in Golden have been producing good early-season riding and a sleeper storm in the past 24 hrs has turned down the suck big time! There’s up to 20 fresh in some spots in the last day. Yes, there’s some good powder out there but also a ton of hazards to wreck on if you’re not careful – it’s still early season. Avalanche conditions are considerable and shouldn’t be slept on. Grooming is regular at Quartz, Gorman has been track packed today and we’re about a week away for Silent. The temps are pretty normal (for once), hovering around -8 in the mornings at the trail heads. -keep reading to find out more.

Dabbling in the new storm snow on Dec 9 in Quartz

Untouched backside Silent Pass on Dec 12

Breaking into Holt on Dec 11

Wrecking stuff is part of the game?

Travel

TCH-1 Highway

BIG NEWS! Highway 1 is fully open east of Golden with NO scheduled stoppages and overnight closures.: Kicking Horse Canyon Calendar

Drive Safe

Do us a solid and arrive alive. Check DriveSafe.BC for local conditions.

CALL YOUR KMS!

There’s a bunch of logging traffic on both the Dogtooth FSR (Gorman) and North Spilli FSR (Silent). It’s your responsibility to yield to the bigger vehicles and a very good idea to let them know where you are.

Logging trucks going both ways at Gorman on Dec 11

Snow & Weather

SNOW AND WEATHER

It’s pretty normal to probe between 120-140 over the entire Dogtooth range right now. 1900m’s seems to be the magic number where the freezing level hung in the last big warm storm. Everything above it seems to have been saved from that nasty crust that is prevalent in other areas. But where we don’t have rain crust, we do have a predominately surface hoar layer that will likely be with us for a while.

There’s approx 10 cms of snow in the forecast and the temps are staying remarkably normal for once; not too cold and not too warm.

KHMR reported 32cms in the past week and 197cm YTD.

KHMR snow report on Dec 14

nice view in Quartz on Dec 9

120 cm in Quartz on Dec 9

Braappin around on Dec 9

snow forecast near Quartz on Dec 14

Nice turn in Quartz on Dec 9

Avalanche Safety

Avalanche Conditions

Check Avalanche.ca everyday you ride!

From Avalache.ca on Dec 14: Choose conservative terrain, weak layers in the mid and lower snowpack remain primed for human triggering.

Travel and Terrain Advice from Nov 27:

Stay off recently wind loaded slopes until they have had a chance to stabilize.
Make conservative terrain choices and avoid overhead hazard.
Avoid thin areas like rock outcroppings where you’re most likely to trigger avalanches failing on deep weak layers.

screen shot on Avalanche.ca on Dec 14

Grooming

Quartz is in regular swing now. Grooms will occur as needed. Gorman is getting track packed on Dec 14 and if everything goes right, it will get a full groom on Friday night (Dec 15). Next week we will hopefully get the mobile cabin in its place and then we will get Silent going (goal by next weekend).