US Forest Service Manti-La Sal National Forest

Introduction: Good morning, this is Dave Medara with the USFS Manti-La Sal Avalanche Center with your avalanche and mountain weather advisory. Today is Thursday Dec. 7th, at 7:30AM. This advisory will expire in 24 hours.

CHECK OUT OUR NEW GROOMING EQUIPMENT HERE.

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.

Please give us your observations from the field HERE. The more observations we get, the better this forecast can be.

General Conditions:

High Pressure has been over the region for a week now and we’re starting to see a haze on the horizon, but the inversion could be much worse. With the warming temperatures, things have been fairly pleasant in the Moab area. Some good powder skiing can still be found in the La Sals on sheltered shady slopes but the coverage is still sparse and caution recommended. A weak system this weekend to our north will break down the high pressure a bit a clear out the inversions and pave the way for another system early next week. Keep your fingers crossed. We can use the snow as we are only at about 77% of our normal yearly snowfall at this point.

The road the Geyser Pass trailhead is plowed and passable by a medium clearance vehicle, but it is slippery.

The most exciting news: After 15 years of taking about it, the grooming program in the La Sal Mountains kicked off yesterday with trail running up and over Geyser Pass and a loop or two on the way. Enjoy skaters and Cross-country folks.

Mountain Weather: (At 10,500’) –

Today...Sunny. Highs 35 to 45.
Tonight...Clear. Lows 10 to 20.
Friday...Sunny. Highs in the 40s.
Friday Night...Mostly clear. Lows 15 to 25. South winds 10 to 15 mph after midnight.
Saturday...Partly cloudy. Highs in the 40s. South winds 10 to 15 mph.

Weather Station/ Location	Snow Depth (HS): in./cm	New Snow (HN) in./cm	7:00 a.m. Temp (F)	Current Observations: Wind, 48 hour snow
Geyser Pass Trailhead (9,600’): (snotel link)	17”		25	faceting
Geyser Pass	21”		N/a	Re-crystallized pow
Gold Basin and South Mountain	19”		n/a	POWDER (& rocks!)
Pre-Laurel Peak Station (11,705’)	N/a	N/a	24	5-15 mph @ NNE

Avalanche Conditions: (Link to the International Avalanche Danger Scale here) –

Not much new info to report. Check out some of the avalanches we saw on our tour last Wednesday here. There was widespread activity on North and NE facing slopes and the snowpack tests we did supported those observations. We are on a decreasing avalanche danger trend at this time and there is not much going on. Cover is light and it is rocky out there. Not even enough snow at this point for avalanches to run on a lot of the more exposed and sunny slopes. We are calling the avalanche danger MODERATE, as we feel that there are still a few North and East facing slopes out there that could be reactive to the weight of a skier. The snowpack continues to weaken with faceting in the upper pack and surface hoar deposition as well. Things will be pretty exciting when we get some new snow. Thanks for checking in, we’ll update this message Saturday morning.