In partnership with: The Friends of the Utah Avalanche Center, Utah Department of Public Safety
Division of Comprehensive Emergency Management, Salt Lake County, and Utah
State Parks
To have this advisory automatically e-mailed to you each day free of charge, click HERE.
Good morning, this is Evelyn Lees with the
We’re giving two free avalanche awareness talks next week – one on Tuesday, the 16th, at the Salt Lake REI and the second on Thursday, the 18th, at the Sandy REI. Both start at 7pm.
Current Conditions:
Yesterday’s weak disturbance fizzled out rather rapidly. The winds quieted down by noon, and snowfall was severely limited to a few inches in the last 24 hours. This morning, skies are mostly cloudy, and temperatures are in the low to mid teens. The winds are from a westerly direction, and are averaging less than 10 mph. If you’re hunting for powder, most shady slopes still have good turning and riding conditions, with a bit of wind damage along the higher ridges. The steeper sunny slopes are crusted from Tuesday.
Avalanche Conditions:
The
winds transported less snow than I expected, and backcountry reports indicated
only pockety, shallow wind slabs, mostly confined to the higher ridges. So, as you’re traveling today, watch out for
and avoid any hard, cracky wind slabs on steep slopes. These drifts will be most common along the
ridges crests, on northerly through easterly facing slopes, but there could be a
few scattered drifts midslope, too. Fortunately,
the majority of the terrain escaped the wind, and on these slopes the avalanche
danger remains low, with surface sluffing the greatest hazard.
Bottom Line (
The avalanche danger is MODERATE on slopes steeper than 35 degrees with recent
deposits of wind drifted snow. Out of the wind affected terrain, the avalanche danger is LOW.
Mountain Weather:
An upper level low is going to slide down through central
3-Day Table |
3-Day Graph |
7-Day Table |
For specific digital forecasts for selected mountain areas from the
National Weather Service, click the links below or choose your own specific
location at the National
Weather Service Digital Forecast Page:
General
Information:
If
you are getting into the backcountry, please give us a call and let us know
what you’re seeing, especially if you trigger an avalanche. You can leave a message at 524-5304 or
1-800-662-4140. Or you can e-mail an
observation to uac@avalanche .org, or you can fax an
observation to 801-524-6301.
The
Friends of the
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.
Andrew
will update this advisory on Friday morning.
Thanks for calling.
_____________________________________________________________________________
For more detailed weather
information go to our Mountain Weather Advisory
National
Weather Service - Salt Lake City - Snow.
For an explanation of
avalanche danger ratings:
http://www.avalanche.org/usdanger.htm