Reported Monday, November 21, 2011 at 6:50 AM

	Weather Forecast Today: Cloudy, 2-4" snow, west southwest winds 5-15 mph and a high of 32. Tonight: Clearing skies, 0-2" snow, west northwest winds 10-20 mph and a low around 15. Tomorrow: Partly sunny, west northwest winds 10-20 mph and a high of 32. Weather Outlook A fast moving storm will track through western Colorado today. It looks like the majority of the moisture will be to our south, but the Kebler Pass and Paradise Divide areas could receive some decent accumulations. Lingering orographic showers will continue in the mountains through the evening before the skies clear on Tuesday and high pressure builds through the holiday. Unsettled weather returns later in the week as the next system heads our way Friday morning.

The avalanche danger is MODERATE (Level 2) near and above treeline and on Northwest through North through East aspects below treeline. The danger remains LOW (Level 1) below treeline on all other aspects.

LIKELIHOOD OF TRIGGERING

AVALANCHE SIZE

Trend

Previous westerly winds have drifted snow into slabs onto north through east aspects and may have cross-loaded south and westerly slopes near and above treeline. It remains possible to trigger avalanches on steep lee and cross-loaded terrain. Watch for cracking and collapsing but also stay tuned in to what lies below this weekend's storm. Larger and more destructive avalanches are still a lingering threat in steep shady alpine terrain where buried hard slabs are present.

Yesterday’s warmer temperatures and scattered sunshine helped with the bonding of previous storm snow in the upper snowpack. However, our early season snowpack is still shallow, variable and structurally unsound. The recipe for a slab avalanche, strong over weak layering, is present on all slopes where denser wind affected snow is resting on weak sugary snow.

One report of skier triggered avalanche (R2 D2) in the Marble area from yesterday on a northeast slope above treeline indicates that wind slabs resting on weaker snow remain reactive to human triggering. If the forecasted amounts of snow and wind are exceeded by this afternoon anticipate the avalanche danger to rise near and above treeline as another layer of shallow soft slabs will be added to the snowpack.

Below treeline the snowpack is generally weak on shady aspects and extremely shallow or bare on sunny slopes.