Members of Kodiak Island’s Search and Rescue Team are urging caution in the backcountry this spring due to avalanche risk.
Kodiak Island doesn’t have a ski resort, but the local search and rescue group has noticed an uptick of skiers exploring popular backcountry areas like Pyramid Mountain in recent years, and this year is no exception. Steve Wielebski is the president of Kodiak Island Search and Rescue, or KISAR.
“We’ve had a banner year of snow, which is great for the skiers,” said Wielebski. “I don’t have any in my yard here, but in the mountains there’s places where we have 10 feet of snow or more, even.”
That’s not record breaking by Kodiak standards. Rain falling in town turns to snow at higher elevations – often plastering the island’s highest peaks with snow. And that snowpack tends to be pretty stable – big wet storms move in and bond layers of snow to one another. That’s unlike snowpacks in the Alaska interior or Lower 48’s Mountain West, where dryer layers of snow often pile up like unstable shelves after a storm.
“Then you can get rain on top of that and the snowpack acts as a sponge and just absorbs it and it trickles down through the snowpack,” said Wielebski. “And in some cases, especially if it gets cold at night, it can help stabilize the snow. But at some point there’s a breaking point that it gets so heavy it can slide.”
Wielebski said that’s what Search and Rescue is seeing right now – particularly after a big snowstorm Seward’s Day weekend.
Sunny, warm days can also heat up the snow. That can make for great skiing – and increase the avalanche danger.
“If you go out on these steep slopes, what it will do is it will make the snow so wet because it’s warmed up – it will start to slide once you ski across it,” said Wielebski.
Sticking to lower angle slopes of 25 degrees and less is one way to mitigate the risk. Kodiak’s search and rescue group is also teaming up with the Alaska Avalanche School for a beginner-level avalanche course on the island this weekend (Fri., April 8 through Sun. April 10). There’s already a waitlist for the class, and Wielebski said they’re hoping to get input from the public about scheduling more courses in the future.
“That gives us a little bit of a chart or a list about maybe we should do this again,” he said.
Meantime, Wielebski said the quickest way to evaluate snow conditions is to look for signs of fresh avalanches when exploring the mountains. And always travel with an avalanche beacon, probe and shovel.