Forecast: Provo Area Mountains - Utah Avalanche Center

Forecast for the Provo Area Mountains

Issued by Drew Hardesty on
Monday morning, December 21, 2020

A CONSIDERABLE avalanche danger remains on many slopes at the mid and upper elevations. Human triggered avalanches 1-2' deep remain likely...and may still be triggered from a distance.

Conservative decision making is essential.

Low

Moderate

Considerable

High

Extreme

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Weather and Snow

Happy Solstice.

Skies are clearing after yesterday's warm front. Temps are in the mid to upper 30s; winds are west to northwest blowing 15-20mph.

For today, temps will rise to the upper 30s with light northwest winds.

We'll see a cold front tomorrow that will drop an inch or two of snow but drop temps to the single digits.

Clearing for the later part of the week.

Recent Avalanches

Yesterday my partners and I experienced widespread cracking and collapsing from 7000' up to nearly 9500'. We intentionally triggered two small pockets 15" deep and 30' wide (photo) on very steep rollovers; each running on the old faceted snow from November. The full write-up of our field day can be found HERE>

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Description

While we heard of our avalanche activity yesterday, collapsing and long shooting cracks along with damning snowpack tests are evidence enough of a generally unstable snowpack. These avalanches are what we call 'Unmanageable' - that is, they are predictable in their unpredictability: they may be triggered at a distance or from below. Note that many of these avalanches rip out mid slope and well off the ridgelines.

Continue to give yourself plenty of margin. Travel advice would be to stick to low angle terrain until the snowpack has adjusted.

The snowpack has a hard time adjusting with every event that adds additional stress - like the previous days' strong northwest winds along the exposed ridgelines.

These avalanches are failing on the NFL - the November Facet Layer - and unfortunately leave plenty of faceted grains on the bed surface, waiting for the next slab of snow. These are called Repeater avalanches. Repeater slopes can be particularly tricky as they can be difficult to identify with the next blanket of snowfall.

Type

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Likelihood

Size

Description

Soft and hard wind drifts can be triggered primarily along the higher elevations. These drifts may look smooth and rounded or scalloped and wavy. They may also break out above you. Look for them on predominantly north through east to south facing slopes and know that any triggered wind drift may step down into older weak faceted snow.

General Announcements

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

Observations and Avalanches

Backcountry Emergency Procedures