24 Hour Snow: 0" 72 Hour Snow: 0" Season Total Snow: 21" Depth at Gold Basin: 15"

Winds on Pre-Laurel Peak: WSW 5-10 Temp: 27° F

Weather

High pressure continues to dominate the weather pattern bringing another day of warm temperatures, light winds, and mostly clear skies. A weak low-pressure trough over Arizona will send some high clouds into the area Monday morning with clearing by the afternoon. The ridge begins to flatten on Tuesday with the jet stream finally dipping a little further south into northern Utah and Colorado bringing a little snow to those areas. We, unfortunately, remain high and dry. Zonal flow continues into early next week with the jet stream remaining well to our north. Long range modeling show our chances for a significant Christmas storm to be dwindling.

General Conditions

Thin and variable best describe conditions. Sunshine and warm temperatures have taken a toll on solar aspects and more and more bare ground is being exposed each day. Relentless winds from the northwest have hammered exposed slopes facing west through north, and many of these slopes above tree line are scoured down to the rocks. Chris Benson went up around Mount Peale from the south side yesterday and found firm, spring-like conditions on slopes that held snow. He did note the presence of underlying weak, faceted snow and some areas with hard, over-riding wind slabs but they are far and few between. Read his observation here.

Chris Benson sent in this photo of the wind blasted NW face of Mount Peale. Note the mountain goats on the ridge in the foreground.

Type of terrain where you may find a hard wind slab over facets. Chris Benson photo.

Snowpack and Weather Data

NEW! Gold Basin webcam storm stake

Gold Basin Storm Stake (10,000')