No-Go terrain:

Avoid slopes approaching 35 degrees or steeper with recent wind deposits. They will be hard, stiff and stubborn. Some of them sit on weak, faceted snow and they will break up above you. With a thin snowpack even small avalanches are very dangerous because of all the exposed rocks. You should find them above tree line and near ridges and especially on west facing slopes.

Safer terrain:

All slopes of 30 degrees or less.

You may have noticed a bit of wind yesterday.

It was about a close as you can get to a hurricane in Utah. It was the largest canyon wind event since 2000. The town of Centerville had 102 mph wind, which stripped many of its trees away and many of the communities along the base of the Wasatch Range north of SLC had wind in the 80-90 range. I spent the morning yesterday dealing with all the wind damage in my neighborhood near the University of Utah including downed power lines in the alley way. The power finally came back on this morning at 3:00 am when I woke up to come into the office. Many thanks to the hard working linemen who slaved away all night in the cold wind.

But as with most canyon wind events, the winds in the mountains are not nearly as strong. Yesterday morning when many of the trees were being uprooted along the Wasatch Front, the mountain winds were just a garden-variety breeze from the east with gusts a measly 40 mph. The Ogden area mountains seemed to suffer the brunt of the winds with the very exposed Ogden Peak site gusting to 91. Mark White has some great photos of wind damage on the Park City ridge line.

As far as backcountry, snow surface conditions, they are mostly horrible and generally not worth the effort. Most of the snow is faceted with sun crusts and wind slabs sprinkled with pine needles. But you can still find some fun, soft, loud powder (recrystalized snow) on wind-sheltered, northerly-facing slopes above about 9,000'.

Hot tip: I was in Logan a couple days ago and they have more snow than the Wasatch Range and it's soft powder in many areas and mostly stable. But don't tell them Isaid so.

Winds have died down and mountain temperatures are in the low to mid 20's

There were no reports of human triggered avalanches yesterday.

We should have a rest day today with a few high clouds later in the day. Mountain temperatures should be in the mid 20's with overnight lows near zero.

A weak cold front will arrive overnight and may give us a couple inches of new snow. At this point, we will take anything we can get. Winds should remain reasonable. Temperatures for the weekend will be cold, near 10 during the day and near zero overnight.

The extended forecast is for continued pessimism--no significant snow in sight.

If you trigger an avalanche in the backcountry - especially if you are adjacent to a ski area – please call the following teams to alert them to the slide and whether anyone is missing or not. Rescue teams can be exposed to significant hazard when responding to avalanches, and do not want to do so when unneeded. Thanks.

Salt Lake – Alta Central (801-742-2033)

Ogden – Snowbasin Patrol Dispatch (801-620-1017)

Provo – Sundance Patrol Dispatch (801-223-4150)

Dawn Patrol Forecast Hotline, updated by 05:30: 888-999-4019 option 8.

Daily observations are frequently posted by 10 pm each evening.

Subscribe to the daily avalanche advisory e-mail click HERE.

UDOT canyon closures UDOT at (801) 975-4838

You have the opportunity to participate in the creation of our own community avalanche advisory by submitting avalanche and snow observations. You can also call us at 801-524-5304 or 800-662-4140, or email by clicking HERE

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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.

We will update this forecast tomorrow morning. Thanks for calling.