The Utah Avalanche Center Home page is: http://www.avalanche.org/~uac/
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Logan
Hello and good morning, this is Toby Weed of the
Current Conditions:
You’ll
need to bundle-up and be prepaired for seriously arctic conditions if you plan a
trip in the backcountry today. It’s currently -8 degrees at the
CSI weather station on Logan Peak, -6 at Beaver Mountain, and 4 in
Smithfield. Even under mostly clear
skies, it’ll stay fridgid today with mountain high temperatures in the single
digits. Strong northerly winds
blasted exposed terrain yesterday, and you’ll find stiff and soft drifts and
other wind carnage at all elevations in many areas. A half inch of water, or 5 or 6 inches
fell in the last 24 hrs, and there’s 76 inches of total snow on the ground at
the Tony Grove Snotel with 86% of average water contained in the
snow.
Avalanche Conditions:
My party triggered a few
small freshly formed wind drift avalanches in yesterday’s tempest. We felt in control of the small
avalanches, which would pop out mid slope or in terrain features as we sped over
them. We noted obvious signs or red
flags, like significant loading, building, almost yellowish looking drifts, and
shooting cracks. Where we were, the
strong winds probably destroyed most of the frost crystals and near surface
facets that developed under clear skies on Sunday and Monday nights.
You might find some
sizable wind slabs today in exposed upper elevation terrain. These should be fairly obvious, smooth
and chalky in appearance, and perhaps somewhat hollow sounding. You should avoid steep drifted
slopes at all elevations, as some of today’s wind slabs could be larger than
expected and carry you for a dangerous ride.
I still must mention the
faint possibility of dangerous and destructive deep slab avalanches. There may be isolated slopes in the
region where a deep slab is not well anchored to underlying smooth terrain and
where it is thin enough for the instability to be activated by your weight or
that of a smaller overrunning wind slab avalanche.
Bottom Line:
There’s a MODERATE danger on
steep drifted slopes in the backcountry, and wind slab avalanches are possible
in terrain exposed to north winds at all elevations. Although currently unlikely, deadly
triggered deep slab avalanches are still possible on isolated slopes with
existing weak snow near the ground, most likely in exposed upper elevation
terrain. Use good snow assessment
and safe travel techniques to minimize your risks.
Mountain
Weather:
A
very cold air-mass will be over the region today, and expect arctic-like
conditions overnight. A cold
northerly flow will persist through the weekend and temperatures will only
gradually warm. The next potential
storm won’t arrive until Sunday night or Monday.
General Information:
Check out photos of avalanches
in the Logan Area on our images
page.
Go to the
Avalanche
Encyclopedia
if you have any questions about terms I use in the
advisory
I'm very
interested to know what you're seeing out there. Please
e-mail observations to me at [email protected] or leave me a
message at 755-3638, especially if you see or trigger an avalanche in the
backcountry. We keep all observations confidential.
This advisory
will expire in 24 hours from the posting time.
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.
