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Avalanche Information
Friday, April 15, 2005 6pm
Good evening, this is Brett Kobernik with the
Weather Outlook:
After experiencing cooler temperatures Thursday and Friday the snowpack produced
some good corn skiing. Another decent refreeze
should occur Friday night then things warm up substantially for the
weekend. On Saturday, 10,000’ free air
temperatures will be in the upper 30’s.
Saturday night will stay warm and terrain lower then around 9000 feet
probably won’t get down to freezing.
Sunday is warmer yet with 10,000’ temperatures in the low to mid 40’s. A trof will start
to affect the area Sunday through Tuesday bringing cooler temperatures.
Avalanche Information:
I received some reports of the expected wet snow activity from earlier in the
week and a somewhat unusual human
triggered avalanche that one of our observers triggered on Thursday. It was on a 39 degree southeast facing slope
in Bunnels Fork in the Cascade ridge area. It was described as a 6” thick frozen slab
that released on wet grains below it. It
was 150 feet wide, ran around 2000 feet vertical and
the fracture line was up to 16” deep. It
was triggered by testing the slope with a slope cut and the skier was almost
caught but got off of the slab before it really got going.
This is exactly the conditions
we will need to watch for this weekend.
The observer noted that he was able to easily identify this weakness by
punching through the crust and checking the underlying snow. Don’t let a firm snow surface trick you. Do a little investigation to see what is
underneath it looking for wet unconsolidated snow.
With a good refreeze tonight,
Saturday morning could produce excellent corn conditions, but get after it
early as things are sure to get sloppy during the day. With warm temperatures forecast for Saturday
night, any refreeze will be shallow and you will need to be very careful on
Sunday.
Notices:
Today concludes the Powderbirds heli skiing operation
for the season so we will no longer inform you of their daily presense.
The advisory on our web page
contains a user survey. Please take a
few minutes to complete it so we can better our forecasts for you. The web site is utahavalanchecenter.com, click
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As we’re still putting out
avalanche information, if you run across anything we should know about, please
call and leave a message at 524-5304 or 1-800-662-4140, or e-mail us at [email protected]. Fax is 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.
We’ll update this forecast as
conditions warrent, and thanks for calling.