Wasatch Cache National Forest

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, visit: http://www.mailermailer.com/x?oid=16351h          

For photos of avalanches and avalanche phenomenon, visit:  http://www.avalanche.org/%7Euac/photos_03-04.htm      (Updated 3/25)

Photos sent in by observers throughout the season visit:  http://www.avalanche.org/~uac/obphotos/observer.html      (Updated 4/2)

For a list of backcountry avalanche activity, visit:  http://www.avalanche.org/%7Euac/Avalanche_List.htm     (Updated 3/31)

 

Early morning preliminary information by about 6:00 am: 801-364-1591

 

Avalanche advisory

Sunday, April 11, 2004,   7:30 am

 

Good morning, this is Drew Hardesty with the Forest Service Utah Avalanche Center with your backcountry avalanche and mountain weather advisory.  Today is Sunday, April 11, 2004, and it’s 7:30 a.m.  This forecast is brought to you in partnership with the Friends of the Utah Avalanche Center, supported in part by the Uinta Brewing Company.  Today will be our last morning advisory for the season, but we’ll continue to issue intermittent afternoon updates through the remainder of spring.   We want to thank our Friends, observers, and supporters for another great season in the Wasatch – we couldn’t do this without your help.

 

Current Conditions:

It’s a return to bluebird for today with sunny skies and light to moderate northerly winds.  Overnight lows were in the mid-teens and twenties and snow surfaces should be supportable even as they soften in the afternoon.  Shaded upper elevation areas sport patches of wind-scoured crust interspersed with parcels of shallow powder.  Southerly slopes (what’s left of them) may be something like corn by midday.  The start of a warming trend will be offset by today’s cool northerly winds in the 10-15mph range.  It should be a glorious day in the hills.

 

Avalanche Conditions:

Today’s avalanche problems will be minor and associated with the heating of the few inches we picked up on Friday.  This should produce only roller-balls and pinwheels and a slide for life scenario on the steeper slopes would be more of a reality than any associated with the snowpack.  Outlying areas that received more snow on Friday, such as the  Logan, eastern Ogden mountains, and the Uintas may be more problematic with wet activity from the 3-6” they saw on Friday.

 

Bottom Line for the Salt Lake, Park CITY, OGDEN AND Provo AREA MOUNTAINS:

The danger is generally LOW. The outlying areas mentioned above will have a danger of wet activity rising to MODERATE on steep sun exposed slopes.

 

Uinta Mountains:  For Uinta specific information, click on Western Uintas on the advisory page or phone 1-800-648-7433.

Logan: click HERE or call 435-797-4146

 

Mountain Weather:

Under sunny skies, 8000’ highs will be in the mid-40’s with ridgetop temps warming to the low thirties.  We are, however, in the start of a warming trend that should push ridgetop temps into the mid-40’s by late Tuesday.  A weak brush-by to the north should cool temps somewhat on Wednesday with a possible storm on tap for the weekend.

 

For specific digital forecasts for the Salt Lake, Provo or Ogden mountains, CLICK HERE.

 

General Information:

The Wasatch Powderbird Guides were grounded yesterday and will be in the AF drainage today.

 

Backcountry snow and avalanche information is still useful to us.  If you’re heading into the backcountry and see anything interesting, give us a call at 524-5304 or 1-800-662-4140.  You can send an e-mail to uac@avalanche .org, or you can fax an observation to 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.

 

Thanks for calling.

 

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