Avalanche Advisory
Advisory: Ogden Area Mountains Issued by Evelyn Lees for Saturday - November 18, 2017 - 7:20am
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With a decent shot of snow from this storm, it may be possible to carefully get out on the snow on grassy slopes and smooth roads. There is a generally LOW avalanche danger, but the danger increases to MODERATE on steep,wind drifted upper elevation slopes facing northerly through easterly.

Remember that each year we have early season close calls, accidents, and sometimes avalanche fatalities. Montana has tragically suffered th e first avalanche fatality of the season on October 7th. Remember that traumatic injury is also more prevalent in the early season owing to the thin snow coverage - tread lightly. Lastly, one must treat the unopened ski area terrain as the backcountry as the avalanche teams have yet to do control work. Please check in with them if you have any questions or about their uphill travel policies.

We will have morning updates through the weekend with additional forecasts as conditions warrant.




special announcement


For more info on the Ogden Backcountry Bash, click here

Our Education and Calendar pages are already chock-full of classes and events - find something that suits you, like our Companion Rescue workshops, a free Know Before You Go awareness talk, or sign up for our of our Backcountry 101 classes.

Longtime observer Tom Diegel has a great blog series called The Little Things (that might keep you alive). He has four installments. You can find these and many other great essays and posts in the UAC blog series here.

current conditions

Skies are clear this morning and temperatures are in the teens. The winds are variable in the Ogden area mountains, blowing anywhere from the northwest to southwest, and generally averaging less than 10 mph, with some higer peaks averaging 20 mph. Mt Ogden is unavailable. Here are storm totals:

Ogden area mountains: 12 – 18” of new snow, landing on mostly bare ground, though the upper elevation, shady slopes did have shallow, old snow. (see below)

Monte Cristo: did especially well, and now has just over 2 feet of snow on the ground.

If you venture out today to test out your gear, remember that whatever the snow is covering now was likely bare ground yesterday.

Bill Hunt took some amazing photos Wednesday and you can find them here, with a couple of Snowbasin below. They certainly depict 4-6" of two-week old snow on the shady slopes above about 8500'.

Avalanche Problem 1
type aspect/elevation characteristics
LIKELIHOOD
LIKELY
UNLIKELY
SIZE
LARGE
SMALL
TREND
INCREASING DANGER
SAME
DECREASING DANGER
over the next 24 hours
description

With the strong winds both before and after yesterday's cold front, a few wind drifts may have formed at the upper elevations and be sensitive to a person. If you find a pillow of deeper, denser snow or cracking in the snow, you're in wind drifted terrain and should avoid steep slopes. I would be most concerned about the wind drifts where they are sitting on old snow on the shady, upper elevation slopes.
weather

High pressure will build across the region today, bringing a warming trend through Sunday. Mostly sunny skies today, with highs in the upper 20s to low 30s and light and variable winds. Speeds at the highest elevations could average 20 to 30 mph at times. Sunday will be sunny and warmer, with temperatures reaching 40 at 8,000' in the Ogden area mountains. A weak storm system will graze the area on Monday, with a mix of rain and snow, followed by unseasonably warm and dry weather.
general announcements

Remember your information can save lives. If you see anything we should know about, please help us out by submitting snow and avalanche conditions. You can also call us at 801-524-5304, email by clicking HERE, or include #utavy in your tweet or Instagram.

To get help in an emergency (to request a rescue) in the Wasatch, call 911. Be prepared to give your GPS coordinates or the run name. Dispatchers have a copy of the Wasatch Backcountry Ski map.

Backcountry Emergencies. It outlines your step-by-step method in the event of a winter backcountry incident.

If you trigger an avalanche in the backcountry, but no one is hurt and you do not need assistance, please notify the nearest ski area dispatch to avoid a needless response by rescue teams. Thanks.

EMAIL ADVISORY If you would like to get the daily advisory by email you will need to subscribe here.

DAWN PATROL Hotline updated daily by 5-530am - 888-999-4019 option 8.

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Utah Avalanche Center mobile app - Get your advisory on your iPhone along with great navigation and rescue tools.

Lost or Found something in the backcountry? - http://nolofo.com/

Ski Utah mobile snow updates

To those skinning uphill at resorts: it is critical to know the resort policy on uphill travel. You can see the uphill travel policy for each resort here.

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This information does not apply to developed ski areas or highways where avalanche control is normally done. This advisory is from the U.S.D.A. Forest Service, which is solely responsible for its content. This advisory describes general avalanche conditions and local variations always occur.