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Heli Ski Season Approaches

As the Heli Ski season approaches, it seems the Long Range Forecast to date has been pretty much correct and the early season snow keeps on building deeper and deeper! Reports and observations confirm that this past week alone, we received over 2 meters (6 feet) of snow, treeline and above, and it's showing no signs of stopping! We expect to see another 1 to 2 meters (3 to 6 feet) more over the next several days.

The trees have shed all their leaves and the air is starting to feel crisp. The first Ski tourers of the season have come back with reports of deep snow, great coverage and powder turns already! This certainly feels like a "normal" November and bodes well for the season outlook of cooler temps and above average precipitation.

We have begun to actively monitoring the snow and avalanche conditions as the heli ski season approaches. It is important to keep track of all the layers of snow as they form so that we can create an accurate picture of the snowpack from the beginning. The coastal mountain snowpack is known for its deep sable structure but that doesn’t make our job any different. It still needs to be monitored meticulously so that we are armed with as much knowledge as possible while we travel through the mountains.

As the heli ski season draws near, we also begin to get organized to build our snowcat roads for our Cat Skiing Backup. We require a minimum of about a meter of snow at our lowest elevations and we can then start building roads, although the more we have the easier it is. Most of our cat roads are not roads underneath at all, but just trails cut through forest. They require a nice fat layer of snow to massage into roads in order to make sure the cats can run safely and quickly to the top of the mountain.

We hope to get up into the mountains ourselves to have a look the second the weather breaks. We will keep the updates coming so stay tuned! As the season starts be sure to follow the latest conditions on the Current Skiing Conditions page which will be updated daily.