Wasatch Cache and Uinta National Forests

In partnership with: Forest Service Utah Avalanche Center, Utah State Parks, The Friends of the Utah Avalanche Center,

Tri-City Performance, Polaris, the Utah Snowmobile Association, the National Weather Service, BRORA, and Backcountry Access.

  

 

 

avalanche advisory

saturday march 31, 2007

The information in this advisory expires 24 hours after the date and time it’s issued, but will be updated Sunday April 1, 2007.

 

Good Morning! This is Craig Gordon with the Forest Service Utah Avalanche Center with your avalanche and mountain weather advisory for the western Uinta Mountains. Today is Saturday, March 31, 2007 and it’s about 7:00 am. Regularly scheduled avalanche advisories for the western Uinta’s are available on Wednesday, Saturday, Sunday and all holidays and are brought to you in partnership with Utah State Parks and Recreation.

This advisory covers the terrain from Daniels Summit, to Mirror Lake, to the North Slope of the western Uinta Mountains. That’s a lot of turf and I can’t be in all of these places at once. Your snow and avalanche observations are critical to this program and help to save other riders lives by getting accurate information out to the public. I’m interested in what you’re seeing especially if you see or trigger an avalanche. Please call 801-231-2170, or email at [email protected] and fill me in with all the details.

 

Current Conditions:

A weak ridge of high pressure moved over the region last night producing partly cloudy skies and creating a slight temperature inversion this morning. Currently at 10,000’ it’s in the low to mid 20’s and at 8,000’ in the upper teens. Winds are generally out of the west-northwest averaging 15-25 mph, though along the highest ridges it’s been blowing steadily in the 30-40 mph range for most of the night. Riding and turning conditions have vastly improved since the midweek storm settled in and wrap around moisture turned out to be the gift that kept on giving. Snow totals above 9,500’ are in the 8”-10” range and you may find a favored location or two where it’s closer to a foot.   

 

Avalanche Conditions:

This storm has been good to the western Uinta’s, laying down a nice new coat of white paint, helping to cushion the hard old melt crusts. Unfortunately, storm totals didn’t stack up to over-the head and over-the-hood proportions as forecast, but I was surprised yesterday at just how good the riding was, especially at upper elevations. The winter-like conditions of the past few days will be changing as the strong springtime sun makes an appearance and today we’ll be dealing with two different types of avalanche problems- dry snow up high on shady slopes and shallow wet avalanches on all steep sun exposed aspects.

First off, though the storm came in with little wind its exit ushered in strong ridge top winds overnight, whipping the new light density snow into shallow wind drifts along the leeward side of upper elevation ridges. The new wind slabs will be easy to detect by their fat, pillow-like appearance and may be sensitive the additional weight of a rider, predictably cracking around or below you. Also, in upper elevation terrain sheltered from the wind, you’ll be able to trigger shallow sluffs within the new snow on steep slopes. Both are very manageable and in either case a well placed slope cut will give you a good feel for the stability of the slope.

As the sun pokes out for the first time since the beginning of the storm it won’t take long for the new snow to get damp and gloppy, particularly during the heat of the day. You can expect the usual round of shallow wet avalanches to occur, especially on steep sun exposed slopes, so as the day wares on you’ll want to avoid being on or underneath any steep slope that’s getting baked by the sun.

Even though the avalanche conditions seem pretty tame, there are some hard slick bed surfaces for avalanches to run on, so think about the consequences of triggering even a shallow slide and going for an unexpected ride down a steep slope.      

 

Bottom Line:

On most slopes throughout the range the avalanche danger is generally LOW this morning, rising to MODERATE on steep sun-exposed slopes during the heat of the day. A MODERATE avalanche danger means human triggered avalanche are possible. 

Wind drifted slopes above tree-line, especially those steeper than about 35 degrees, have pockets of MODERATE avalanche danger and human triggered dry snow avalanches are possible.

 

Mountain Weather:

Partly cloudy skies are on tap for most day, though we can expect increasing afternoon clouds as a weak Pacific disturbance crosses the area tonight. It’ll be cool with highs at 8,000’ in the low 40’s and at 10,000’ near freezing. Overnight we’ll see a flurry or two and lows under mostly cloudy skies should dip into the mid 20’s. Winds will remain out of the west-northwest averaging 10-20 mph at most locations, gusting into the 40’s along the high peaks. Mostly cloudy skies are slated for Sunday with temperatures warming into the low 50’s. A somewhat stronger system will send a cold front through the area Sunday night into Monday and we might be able to squeak 3”-6” out of this storm before warm high pressure returns Tuesday through the end of the week.

 

Announcements:

I completed a preliminary investigation on the avalanche accident that occurred on Saturday Feb.17th in Buck Basin and it can be found here. Also there have been a number of close calls and unintentionally human triggered avalanches across the state in the past few days and pictures with descriptions of the events can be found here.

 

The Windy Peak weather station is up and running. Click here for current conditions.

 

I’d like to thank Jim Shea, The Canyons and Colleen Graham from the Friends of the UAC for all their hard work in making the Know Before You Go fundraiser such a success!

 

The first annual western Uinta fundraising ride was an amazing success with nearly 150 people showing up for the ride alone!

I want to thank the Jim Shea Family Foundation, Rocky Mountain Sledders, the Wasatch Snowmobile Association and the Utah Snowmobile Association for all their tireless work in putting the event together. Thanks again to Team Thunderstruck and the Boondockers crew for helping out and schooling even the most experienced riders. Also, we couldn’t have pulled it off if it weren’t for Chad Booth who did an incredible job as both master of ceremonies and auctioneer. Finally, it wouldn’t have been possible without the support of everyone who attended… you folks are awesome!  

 

I want to thank the crew at Tri-City Performance in Springville along with Polaris and the Utah Snowmobile Association for partnering with the avalanche center and stepping up to the plate by providing a new sled for this season!  Click here, to see the new ride!

 

We installed Beacon Basin at the Noblett’s Trailhead and it’s good to go. I want to thank Doug, Bill, Jared, Brad and Wally who

unselfishly took time out of their powder day to help out the riding community… you guys rock!

 

Free avalanche awareness classes are available. Give me a call at 801-231-2170 or email [email protected] and get one scheduled before the season gets too crazy!

 
If any terms confuse you, take a look at our new avalanche encyclopedia.

 

For avalanche photos click here.

 

General Information: 

The information in this advisory is from the U.S. Forest Service, which is solely responsible for its content. This advisory describes general avalanche conditions and local variations always occur.

I’ll update this advisory by 7:00 am on Sunday April 1, 2007.

This advisory is also available by calling 1-800-648-7433 or

1-888-999-4019.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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