Wasatch
Cache National Forest
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Avalanche advisory
Wednesday, November 13, 2002
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Good morning, this is Evelyn
Lees with the
We won’t have all our phone lines
hooked up for a couple more days, so you may find it easier to access this
advisory on the internet.
Current Conditions:
Under cloudy skies,
temperatures have remained warm overnight, and are near 30 at most
elevations. Winds are from the
southwest, averaging 10 to 15 mph. The
sunny southerly facing slopes will be well crusted this morning, while settled
powder remains on the shady aspects. Coverage
is still minimal, and expect to scrape at least a few barely covered rocks or stumps
on all but the smoothest, grassiest slopes.
Avalanche Conditions:
Good visibility yesterday showed
the mosaic of avalanche activity. While
many of the steep, upper elevation shady slopes have slid, what I found scary was
the number of slopes that haven’t, and are just waiting for a trigger. In general, the recent avalanches are averaging
about 2 feet deep, 100 to 200’ wide, and are breaking into the old faceted snow
layers from October. However, wider and
deeper slides have occurred, especially with explosives within the resorts.
We have classic “hard slab”
conditions right now – while slides are becoming harder to trigger, they now have
the potential to be larger and trickier – they are more likely to break once
you are well down on to the slope or break on the second or third person. Also numerous “bed surface” slides have been
reported – after a decent size slide has been triggered with in the upper layers
of the snow pack, a second slide releases near the ground as a person moves out
onto the bed surface. If you do get
caught in a slide, the consequences could be especially ugly as the ride would
be over the rocky ground surface.
So the places to avoid are the
moderate to steep shady slopes where there was old October snow remaining
before the recent storms. This is mostly
the northwest through northeast facing slopes above 9,000’, but may also
include east and west facing slopes at very high elevations. The old snow is most widespread in the upper
Cottonwoods and the high elevations in the
Today, a few, new fresh wind
drifts will develop along the ridges and in open bowls, and should be avoided
on any steep slope.
Bottom Line:
The avalanche danger is still
CONSIDERABLE today on northeast, north
and northwest facing slopes, approaching 35 degrees or steeper, above about
9,000’. Considerable means dangerous
human triggered slides are probable.
There’s a MODERATE
danger on those same slopes between 30 and 35 degrees and on steep east and
west facing slopes. LOW danger terrain includes
slopes of about 30 degrees of less, well out from under avalanche terrain.
Mountain Weather:
A weak system will move
across northern
General Information:
Our next free avalanche awareness
class will be Thursday, November 14th at
To report backcountry snow
and avalanche conditions, especially if you observe or trigger an avalanche,
call (801) 524-5304 or 1-800-662-4140.
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.
Bruce Tremper will update this advisory by
Thanks for calling!
________________________________________________________________________
National
Weather Service - Salt Lake City - Snow.
For an explanation of
avalanche danger ratings: