The
Utah Avalanche Center Home page is: http://www.avalanche.org/~uac/
(click on) Utah Avalanche Center in Logan for our home
page
Logan
Hello and good morning, this is Toby Weed
of the
Current
Conditions: You can find fairly good powder conditions with a little
creativity, mainly on sheltered shady slopes at mid and upper elevations. Strong winds from the north and then east in
the latter half of the week blasted exposed terrain, creating nifty patterns
while scouring fluffy snow off windward slopes and re-drifting it into solid
and lurid forms across many of the more popular north and east facing slopes
known normally as fine powder stashes.
The snow in the backcountry is generally supportable, and you can ride
almost anywhere. Most low elevation
slopes sport either shallowly buried and/or surface crusts. A storm passing to our north and east will
bring cloud cover and a chance for a few snowflakes to the mountains
today. A west wind picked up steam
overnight, and the CSI weather station atop
Avalanche Conditions: The
windy storm on Wednesday evening and a pronounced north through east strong
wind-shift on Valentine's Day produced several natural wind slabs in the region
(photo). These occurred at all elevations, and many were
on south and west facing slopes. Of
particular local interest; a natural avalanche carrying a pile of woody debris late
Wednesday stopped on the flats a few feet from the road near the Green Canyon
Gate (2-14 photos).
Both today’s freshly formed or forming wind
slabs and those formed by strong easterly winds on Valentines Day in somewhat
unusual places might be cause for concern today. Fresh drifts or slabs will likely be more
sensitive and should be fairly obvious, while the older, hard and stubborn
slabs may be somewhat obscured. Some wind slabs may have formed on steep slopes
and in avalanche starting zones plagued by weak frost crystals or surface hoar
and in some cases, a slick rime-crust. Remember
that hard slabs tend to be rather stubborn, meaning they might allow you to get
well out on them before releasing.
Bottom Line: Today you’ll find a LOW danger on most steep slopes
in the backcountry, especially in sheltered terrain. However,
there are pockets of MODERATE danger on
some steep slopes in exposed upper elevation terrain where you might trigger new
or older wind slab avalanches. Avoid
obvious drifts on steep slopes and use good snow assessment and safe travel
techniques to minimize your risk.
Mountain
Weather: A storm passing to our north and east will bring cloud cover and a chance
for a little snowfall today. West winds
will gradually shift around from the north. Expect similar conditions as another storm
grazes by tomorrow. It’ll dry out,
bringing fair weather to the region in the first part of next week. A moist and productive system looks to be
lining up for later in the week.
General Announcements:
This advisory will
expire in 24 hours from the posting time.
Check out the images page for photos of some of
last week’s avalanches.
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.
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.
