UDOT PLANNED AVALANCHE CLOSURES!!

Forecast for the Ogden Area Mountains

Issued by Bruce Tremper for
Friday, December 5, 2014

Most terrain has a LOW avalanche danger.

Low
Moderate
Considerable
High
Extreme
Learn how to read the forecast here
Special Announcements

You're going to love it! Today, we are releasing our new Knowledge is Powder video for snowmobilers. The Utah Avalanche Center, with major funding from the International Snowmobile Manufacturers Association, has released a very exciting 9-minute, avalanche safety video for snowmobilers. Starting today, you can view it on Vimeo. Here is the link: https://vimeo.com/113677686 See our complete Press Release on the Blog. Please share this with your friends on social media.

Many thanks to the hard work by producer and editor Trent Meisenheimer along with Craig Gordon and everyone who helped shoot, provide footage, act and all the extras.

Also, looking for a Christmas beacon for yourself or someone you love? Steve Achelis has updated his popular beacon review website.

See more of Steve's projects on our Blog

Weather and Snow

Yes, it's very warm, but the riding conditions are surprisingly good above about 9,000' on the shady aspects with a couple inches of dense, new snow on a spongy, dense Styrofoam base. Other aspects and elevations are damp to soggy. Mountain temperatures remain around freezing and there's enough moisture in the air for scattered clouds later today. Winds are light from the southwest. Here's some observations from yesterday from the Salt Lake area mountains:

Salt Lake 12/4/2014 Observation: White Pine Gulch Bruce Tremper Details
Salt Lake 12/4/2014 Observation: Daily Canyon Shaun Details
Salt Lake 12/4/2014 Observation: Cardiff Peak Weston Details
Salt Lake 12/4/2014 Observation: Willows, West Monitor Evelyn Details


You can also see my video summary of the snowpack and riding conditions from upper White Pine yesterday.

Recent Avalanches

No avalanche activity was reported from yesterday.

Ad
Avalanche Problem #1
New Snow
Type
Location
Likelihood
Size
Description

The very warm temperatures along with a thick, stiff, overlying slab is quickly stabilizing our nemesis depth hoar layer near the ground. Good riddance. With much less old, faceted snow in the Ogden area mountains, the avalanche danger remains mostly Low.

Additional Information

Today, we will see another day with daytime highs at 8,000' around freezing and in the mid 20's at 11,000'. Wind will remain light from the southwest. We should be mostly sunny this morning with high clouds spreading in for this afternoon.

For the extended forecast, we can look forward to a week of warm, boring weather. By next Wednesday, we should see 10,000' temperatures in the upper 30's.

General Announcements

Remember your information can save lives. If you see anything we should know about, please participate in the creation of our own community avalanche advisory by submitting snow and avalanche conditions. You can also call us at 801-524-5304, email by clicking HERE, or include #utavy in your tweet or Instagram.

If you trigger an avalanche in the backcountry - especially if you are adjacent to a ski area – please call the following teams to alert them to the slide and whether anyone is missing or not. Rescue teams can be exposed to significant hazard when responding to avalanches, and do not want to do so when unneeded. Thanks.

Salt Lake and Park City – Alta Central (801-742-2033), Canyons Resort Dispatch (435-615-3322)

Snowbasin Resort Dispatch (801-620-1017), Powder Mountain Dispatch (801-745-3772 x 123).

Sundance Dispatch (801-223-4150)

EMAIL ADVISORY If you would like to get the daily advisory by email you will need to subscribe here.​

DAWN PATROL Hotline updated daily by 5-530am - 888-999-4019 option 8.

Twitter Updates for your mobile phone - DETAILS

UDOT canyon closures: LINK TO UDOT

Utah Avalanche Center mobile app - Get your advisory on your iPhone along with great navigation and rescue tools.

Wasatch Powderbird Guides Blog/Itinerary for the Day.

Lost or Found something in the backcountry? - http://nolofo.com/

Ski Utah mobile snow updates

Discount lift tickets will soon be available at Backcountry.com - Thanks to Ski Utah and the Utah Resorts. All proceeds go towards paying for Utah Avalanche Center avalanche and mountain weather advisories.

To those skinning uphill at resorts: it is your responsibility to know the resort policy on uphill travel. You can see the uphill travel policy for each resort here. IMPORTANT: Before skinning or hiking at a resort under new snow conditions, check in with Ski Patrol. Resorts can restrict or cut off access if incompatible with control and grooming operations.

Benefit the Utah Avalanche Center when you shop from Backcountry.com or REI: Click this link for Backcountry.com or this link to REI, shop, and they will donate a percent of your purchase price to the UAC. Both offer free shipping (with some conditions) so this costs you nothing!

Benefit the Utah Avalanche Center when you buy or sell on ebay - set the Utah Avalanche Center as a favorite non-profit in your ebay account here and click on ebay gives when you buy or sell. You can choose to have your seller fees donated to the UAC, which doesn't cost you a penny.

This information does not apply to developed ski areas or highways where avalanche control is normally done. This advisory is from the U.S.D.A. Forest Service, which is solely responsible for its content. This advisory describes general avalanche conditions and local variations always exist.