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Logan area Avalanche advisory

Early Season Avalanche Statement

 November 16, 2006

Hello, this is Toby Weed of the Utah Avalanche Center in Logan with a special early season avalanche statement.  It's Thursday November 16th, and it's 7:30 in the evening.  This advisory is brought to you in part by the Friends of the Utah Avalanche Center in Logan with the help of the Cache Valley community.

Current Conditions:

The Bear River Range picked up a couple more inches of snow today, and last night southwesterly winds sustained hourly averages of over 30 mph for several hours. There's 27 inches on the total snow stake at the Tony Grove Snotel site containing 4.8 inches of water equivalent.  It' amazing how much snow piled up in a week at higher elevations in the region, but with abundant shallowly buried obstacles, especially at mid elevations,  you still really have to be heads up. 

Avalanche Conditions:

 In the past couple days no one has reported seeing avalanches in the region, and it appears that the recent instabilities between layers of the last week's snow are settling out.  Thankfully, here we're not as plagued by rotten sugary snow called depth hoar as they are at high elevations in the Wasatch Range.  But if you travel into  high elevation terrain it'd still be a good idea to dig down and investigate the base layer.  Most of the problem slopes in the Wasatch where dangerous avalanches could occur are above about 9500' in elevation and face the northern third of the compass.  I have yet to find significant depth hoar around here, but it is a big mountain range and there are hundreds of slopes I haven't examined.   Although avalanches are unlikely on most slopes in the region, you still might find a few sensitive wind slabs on exposed upper elevation slopes.  You should keep an eye out for both freshly formed and shallowly buried drifts and avoid them when on steep slopes.

Bottom Line:

There's a MODERATE avalanche danger on steep slopes at upper elevations in the Logan Area.  Avalanches are possible on drifted slopes facing north and east and steeper than about 35 degrees.  The danger is LOW on lower angled slopes, slopes below about 8500' in elevation, and on sunny slopes where there wasn't any snow last week.

Mountain Weather:

Friday should be mostly cloudy and there's a chance we could pick up a couple more inches of snow before the weekend.  It'll be partly cloudy through the weekend and mild, with gradually rising daytime temperatures.  Monday looks to be almost spring-like, with a few clouds and mountaintop high temperatures of around 50 degrees.  The next system should roll in around Tuesday.

General Information:

Click here for information on this season's upcoming fundraiser. 

 I will give a free Avalanche Talk, open to all, at the Logan Ranger District offices at 1500 E Hwy 89 in Logan on Tuesday, November 21 at 6:30. 

I'm back in the office now, and I'll start producing regular advisories as soon as there's enough snow in the backcountry. Logan Area advisories will be accessible through the new statewide toll-free avalanche info line, call 1-888-999-4019

If you're confused by some of our avalanche terms check out the cool new Avalanche Encyclopedia.  Please  send backcountry observations to [email protected] or leave us a message at 755-3638, especially if you see or trigger an avalanche in the backcountry.

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.