Manti-La Sal Avalanche Center

US Forest Service Manti-La Sal National Forest               

Introduction:  Good morning!  This is Evan Stevens with the USFS Manti-La Sal Avalanche Center with your avalanche and mountain weather advisory.  Today is Saturday, February 5th, 2005 at 7:30 am.  This bulletin is sponsored in part by Canyon Voyages, Moab’s finest river running and retail store, proud sponsors of the Friends of the Manti-La Sal Avalanche Center.  This advisory will expire in 24 hours.

 

To see past advisories check out the ARCHIVE.  To see current conditions go to our WEATHER PAGE.  To see photos go to the AVIPHOTOS page.

 

General Conditions:

Sunny skies and moderate temperatures are providing some excellent conditions to be in the mountains.  Snow surfaces vary significantly depending on your aspect and elevation.  Some excellent, soft and settled powder can be found on northerly aspects and some sheltered upper elevation areas.  Wind crusts and sun crusts can be found almost every where else, with even the occasional barely supportable corn layer in the right sheltered and sunny spot right after the sun hits it.  The roads are plowed, but 4WD is always recommended.

 

Current Conditions: (click location for latest data)

Geyser Pass Trailhead (9,600’):  34” at the SNOTEL site with a temperature of 22 degrees at 6:00 am. 

Pre-Laurel Peak (11,700’):  The last 6 hours of winds are averaging 15-20mph from the SSW with gusts up to the high 30’s.   

Gold Basin and South Mountain:  Around 65” to 75” of settled snow on the ground. 

 

Mountain Weather: (At 10,500’)

Sunny, clear and dry until later on in the weekend…more details as the storm track solidifies, but it looks like a shot of 6-12” starting Sunday evening. 

Today: Partly cloudy, with a high around 36. West southwest wind between 5 and 10 mph.
Tonight: Partly cloudy, with a low around 17. North northwest wind 5 to 10 mph becoming west southwest.
Sunday: A 30 percent chance of snow showers, mainly after noon. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 30. Breezy, with a west southwest wind between 10 and 20 mph.

 

Avalanche Conditions:

The lack of significant weather events in the last few weeks, combined with stable and warm weather has subdued the avalanche danger quite a bit.  Even though we have had some wind speeds in the moderate range, which were strong enough to transport snow, there just isn’t a ton of snow to transport on the leeward aspects.  As a result only small pockets of shallow wind slabs near ridgelines have been detected and these are very unreactive at this point.  Looking into the future, the weak and faceted snow on the surface of the sheltered and shady aspects will be a future weak layer, and is our current source of the only observed avalanche activity-human triggered sluffing on steep (greater than 35 degrees) and shady slopes.  Make sure these small loose snow slides don’t take you for a ride in the wrong spot.  Otherwise travel conditions are excellent and the peaks are waiting for some folks to summit them.  The bottom line is an avalanche danger of LOW on most slopes and aspects.  If you do find some steep snow pockets that haven’t avalanched previously, take caution as you may be the added weight to cause them to fail

 

Nordic and Skate Skiing:

Excellent conditions on packed out trails…the word is that the Abajos have had some great conditions as well so get out and explore.