The avalanche danger is decreasing in the Colorado backcounty, but forecasters are cautioning recreationists that danger still lurks deep in the snowpack.
The Colorado Avalanche Information Center on Tuesday said the state is moving into a “lower probability, high consequence situation.”
The avalanche forecast center described the situation as “scary because it is hard to gain experience dealing with lower-probability avalanches.
“You could navigate through two storm slab or wind slab avalanche cycles in a week of riding, but it could take you 10 years to gain the same amount of experience with very large and hard-to-trigger persistent slab avalanches,” the center wrote on Instagram. “Your first encounter with a very large (D3 or D4 on the destructive scale) avalanche could very well be your last. This makes it very difficult to learn from a close call.”
The center said it’s hard to predict which slopes will fail.
“Because very large persistent slab avalanches are so dangerous, the only safe way to manage your risk is by avoiding those suspect slopes,” the center wrote. “On a bad year like this, you might have to avoid those slopes for the rest of the season.”
The center reminded recreationists that the current moderate danger (Level 2 of 5) can include some pretty big avalanches.
For more information, visit Avalanche.state.co.us.
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