Avalanche Conditions:
There was only one human triggered avalanche reported from the backcountry yesterday. An avalanche class was able to trigger a slide in the Daily Canyon area near Park City. After digging a snowpit on a low angle portion of the slope, they got a collapse fracture that propagated out onto a steep section of the slope. The avalanche was 1 to 4 feet deep and over 600 feet wide. It occurred on a 40 degree east-northeast facing slope at about 8,900’, and broke in some weak faceted snow below an ice crust.
Our Logan forecaster, Toby Weed, visited the site of an accident that occurred on Saturday. This snowmobile triggered slide occurred on a subridge of Naomi Peak in the Logan area mountains. About 1/3 of a steep east-southeast facing bowl released burying the rider and his machine under about 5’ of snow. Fortunately his partners were quick with their beacons and dug him out in about 10 minutes. The slab was the new snow from last week and it ran on a firm sun crust. The slide occurred on a 40+ degree slope at about 9,500’ and was 2 feet deep and about 250 feet wide.
We continue to receive reports of avalanche activity that occurred during the tail end of last week’s storm. Natural and human triggered activity has been reported in the Logan area mountains, as well as the Bountiful Peak area, and the southern Oquirrh Mountains. After a couple of days with mild temperatures our new snow instability has substantially decreased. However, our buried weak layers persist and has the Daily Canyon slide illustrates once activated these avalanches are quite large and dangerous. The areas where you can trigger a deep slab avalanche are now localized, but remember the consequences could be severe.