In
partnership with: The Friends of the Utah Avalanche Center, Utah Department of
Public Safety Division of Comprehensive Emergency Management,
For photos of avalanches and
avalanche activity, 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)
Avalanche INFORMATION - afternoon update
Thursday, April 29, 2004 4:30 pm
Good afternoon, this is Craig
Gordon with the
Current
Conditions:
Yesterday’s trailer tipping
winds gusted into the 50’s at most mountaintop locations and after the cold
front passed, temperatures dropped 32 degrees in just a matter of a few hours.
Unfortunately the cold air outraced most of the moisture, though the
Avalanche Conditions:
Last nights disappointing
storm was more huff than fluff and the only avalanche activity I saw today were
shallow sluffs running naturally on steep slopes when
the sun poked out. Today I could start sluffs easily
in steep terrain with slope cuts. It looks like winds will increase overnight,
so be on the lookout tomorrow for isolated pockets of soft slab, especially
along the upper elevation ridges. In addition, when the sun does come out on
Friday the wet activity will become more widespread. There are some hard slick
crusts out there, so take care that a shallow slide doesn’t knock you off your
skis and take you for a fast body-bruising ride.
Be sure to check the automated weather stations on
the web in the morning to see what happened overnight.
Finally, remember that except
for Snowbird, all of the ski areas are closed – therefore, you’ll need to treat
your favorite resort runs as the backcountry.
Mountain Weather:
The storm will
continue to spin over the state through tonight and we might be able to wring
another 3”-6” of snow out of it before the system pulls away from the region on
Friday. Light east and northerly winds will increase tonight into the 15-25 mph
range. Temperatures will remain cold this evening with overnight lows dipping
into the mid 20’s. Friday should be partly cloudy and warmer with a couple of isolated
morning snow showers. High temperatures at 10,000’ will be in the low 30’s and
at 8,000’ near 40 degrees. Winds will switch to the north during the day and
should be relaxing to less than 10 mph along the ridges. The weekend will offer
clear skies with daytime highs reaching into the low 50’s and overnight lows
near 30 degrees. Strong warming after this weekend will skyrocket ridge top temperatures
reaching into the mid 50’s by Tuesday.
We will likely issue our
last advisory of the season on Friday afternoon.
Backcountry
snow and avalanche information is still useful to us. So if you’re still getting out and see
anything of interest, leave us a message at 524-5304, 1 800-662-4140, drop us
an email at [email protected], or a fax
to 524-6301. The information in this
advisory is from the US Forest Service, which is solely responsible for its
content. This advisory describes general
avalanche conditions and local variations always occur.
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