UKC

Same question(s)

Anybody been up yesterday?

Conditions?

Anything to report?

In reply to Little Billy:

Bump

In reply to Little Billy:

SAIS Blog for Meagaidh has a pic of the face from yesterday. It looks plastered and I think would be a bit unpleasant for climbing.

Another thing to watch is that everywhere on SAIS except Torridon and Meagaidh have High Risk Cat for North aspects. I can understand that for Torridon, but not Meagaidh, especially given what it says in the "Forecasted Snow Stability and Avalanche Hazard," bit under the rose, and what is said in the blog, so watch out.

In reply to jonnie3430:
Forecasted snow amounts overnight and tomorrow for 'Meggie are less than all other areas except Torridon, so there's expected to be less load on the snowpack. However, the 'Considerable' category, statistically, is when most people get involved in avalanches, so care definitely required!

Also keep in mind the wording of the international avalanche hazard scale for the 'Considerable' category:

"Medium to large sized natural avalanches possible. In locations indicated in the reports, human triggered avalanches are likely; the snowpack is poor to weakly bonded in these locations."

The SAIS avalanche forecast is based on a bespoke, hour-by-hour and micro-scale Met Office forecast for each of the 6 mountain areas covered. If the weather on the day actually turns out to be different by a relatively small degree, then the snow conditions and respective avalanche hazard can often be quite different to the forecasted category.

Experienced members of the winter climbing public ought to use the avalanche forecast as a guide and make adjustments to their 'mountain day', factoring in any changes in the weather. The less experienced are probably best advised to take the wording of the avalanche forecast at total face value.

There is a developing buried weak layer issue at 'Meggie at the moment and we may see this playing a bigger part in stability issues if it stays cold and we get significantly more snow (loading).

In reply to Little Billy:
The question is, is there any ice?????

In reply to Drew52:

Yes. But it's nearly all burried.

In reply to Little Billy:

anyone been up to see how things are, still too snowy i presume.

In reply to robgixer:
You're right, still a wee bit too snowy.

Post Face absolutely plastered with snow (when I last glimpsed it the other day....the weather's been awful & viz near zero a lot of the time). All popular gullies full of very deep, not yet fully consolidated snow and/or avalanche/cornice debris. Monster cornices still in place all the way from the top of the Pipes to The Window. Big cornices in lots of other places, too.

Ice?...who can say? Getting to it presents real issues.

Hope this helps.