North Cascades Highway to reopen Tuesday after closure for snow slide risk

KIRO 7 News Staff
·1 min read

State Route 20, also known as the North Cascades Highway, will reopen Tuesday afternoon after a closure due to the risk of snow slides.

The highway will reopen at 1 p.m.

The highway closed at 10 a.m. Saturday after heavy snowfall, according to the Washington State Department of Transportation.

“We’ve already seen as much as 4-6 inches of snow per hour and some small snow slides,” WSDOT said on social media at that time.

Crews were hoping for colder temperatures that could stabilize the snow and evaluated the road on Monday, but the risk of slides persisted.

It was the same story on Tuesday, when WSDOT said the highway would be evaluated on Wednesday.

“Crews are still hoping colder temps will settle conditions for possible reopening but we have to wait and see,” WSDOT said.

But in a surprise update, WSDOT said “the cold weather helped stabilize conditions and allowed our crews to safely clear the road!”