In partnership with: Utah Division of State
Parks and Recreation, The Friends of the Utah Avalanche Center, Utah Department
of Emergency Services and Homeland Security and
AVALANCHE ADVISORY
Tuesday,
February 21, 2006 7:30am
Good morning, this is Drew Hardesty with
the
Life flight will be conducting training operations at the
Spruces area in
I’ll be giving a free Avalanche Awareness talk tonight at
the SLC REI at 7pm. Evelyn will give the
same talk at the Sandy REI Thursday night at 7pm.
A long time fundraiser for the
Current Conditions:
Temperatures remain quite cold under this
west to northwest flow and it’s difficult to find mountain locations this
morning above the single digits. That
and the intermittent cloud cover has very well preserved the cold smoke and all
the heroes are lighting up the hero snow on any and all bold lines in the
Central Wasatch. The winds now play the
role as spoiler, averaging 30 mph with gusts to 40 along the more exposed
ridgelines. Off the ridges, the winds
drop to 10-15 mph. You’ll find sun
crusts on most southerly aspects, with champagne on the north.
Avalanche Conditions:
Not much drama yesterday in the
backcountry with sluffing the only thing to write home about. Some of these sluffs are starting to have
enough oomph as they pick up steam. One
skier can vouch for this, having been carried 75’ on a steep slope until the
slope angle eased. The winds, however,
will drift the new smoke into sensitive soft slabs found primarily along the
higher elevation northeast through southeast facing slopes. They’ll be manageable, perhaps up to a foot
or so deep, breaking just off the ridgelines with a slope cut or cornice
drop. Unlike hard slabs or wise blue
ribbon trout, you won’t have to dig deep into your bag of tricks to get
results.
Bottom Line:
Upper elevation wind drifted slopes steeper than 35 degrees will have a
localized MODERATE danger today. In addition, watch for sluffing in the new
snow that may pile up in confined tracks or abrupt transitions. Non-wind affected areas have a mostly LOW
danger. If the sun comes out for long periods of time, watch for wet loose
sluffs on steep sun-exposed slopes.
Mountain Weather:
Skies will
be partly to mostly cloudy with a few random flakes thrown in for good
measure. 8000’ highs will reach 20
degrees while 10,000’ temps remain in the single digits. The west to northwest winds will be 15-20mph
today with locally higher averages at 11,000’.
We have a relatively uneventful weather pattern lined up for the rest of
the week and into the weekend.
Announcements:
Click here to check out our new online avalanche
encyclopedia.
Early birds and snow
geeks can catch our 6AM report at 364-1591.
Click HERE for a text only version of the avalanche advisory.
To
have this advisory automatically e-mailed to you each day, click HERE.
UDOT also has a highway avalanche control work
hotline for Big Cottonwood, Little Cottonwood, and
Wasatch
Powderbirds flew in Snake Creek yesterday and are poised to hit Silver, Days,
Cardiff, Mineral, Grizzly, White Pine, the Sessions, and Lambs. For more info, call 742-2800.
Please
report any backcountry snow and avalanche conditions. Call (801) 524-5304 or 1-800-662-4140, email [email protected] or fax 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.
Evelyn Lees will
update this advisory by 7:30 Wednesday morning.
Thanks for calling.