The avalanche danger is mostly LOW this morning. Very isolated pockets of hard wind slab dot the upper elevation landscape, primarily on the northerly aspects. The wet avalanche potential will rise to MODERATE with daytime warming on all but the highest northerly facing aspects. Glide avalanches are likely to release through the next couple of days, even, perhaps, after the cold front.

Skies are overcast again but the sun should break through in the next few hours. You’d never guess that the winds were still punishing: 30-40mph with gusts to 70. “Freezing temps” are down to 9000’. Now that half the west desert blankets the “snow”, it’s making it hard to wax. Anyone out there know if either Toko or Swix makes a ‘dust – isothermal snow – wind board’ hi-fluoro wax?

Dust on snow can play a significant role in the world of hydrology, if not the world of avalanches. Our own Tom Painter, skier, researcher, and professor at the U has made significant headway in the understanding of these impacts. Check out this NPR interview from a couple years ago.

Minor wet activity with some skier-initiated rollerballs and pinwheels.

Old school: look out the window to the west. Warm and windy yet again. 8000’ and 10,000’ temps will rise to the upper 40’s and the upper 30’s. Never fear: a cold front should crash through tonight, dropping temps back to the teens putting the brakes on the wind. 4-7” is expected through tomorrow for upper Big Cottonwood and the Ogden mountains - areas favored by a westerly flow. Another storm follows for Friday and again on Monday.

Our web page is now mobile-friendly for users of iPhone and iPod Touch.

Wasatch Powderbird Guides have been grounded due to weather. Their operations planning page is here.

Beacon training parks are up and running! There is one at Snowbasin, one on the Park City side at the top of Canyon’s gondola toward the Tombstone lift, one in Little Cottonwood near the Snowbird parking structure on the bypass road, and in Big Cottonwood a training park is at the west end of Solitude's lower parking lot.

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UDOT highway avalanche control work info can be found by calling (801) 975-4838. Our statewide toll free line is 1-888-999-4019 (early morning, option 8).

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Your snow and avalanche observations can save someone’s life. Please let us know what you're seeing by leaving a message at (801) 524-5304 or 1-800-662-4140, or email us at uac@utahavalanchecenter.org. (Fax 801-524-6301).

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.

Evelyn Lees will update this advisory by 7:30 tomorrow morning.