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
Friday,
April 21, 2006 4pm
Good afternoon, this is Drew Hardesty
with the
We are no longer putting out early morning
advisories for the rest of the year.
We’ll put out intermittent afternoon updates on the web and
Current Conditions:
Mountain temperatures are
skyrocketing into the red zone. Mittens
and down jackets from Wednesday are now a thing of the past, long since traded
in for Hawaiian shirts and flip-flops. Last
night’s overnight low is 20 degrees warmer than Wednesday’s and stands to be up
to ten degrees cooler than tonight’s. With
11,000’ highs reaching 45 degrees, today may have been the last ticket for
hitting dry cold settled powder on the north and supportable corn on the south.
Recent Avalanche Activity & Snowpack Discussion:
Folks have still been able
to find a few rogue wind drifts and storm snow soft slabs from Monday’s
storm. A few slope cuts triggered a
couple settled pockets 6-8” deep and 40’ wide, running over 1000’. These were on very steep northerly facing
slopes in the higher terrain in the
With high thin clouds and
expected overnight lows tonight in the low 40’s, refreezes of the snow surface
will be superficial. Don’t use the last
couple of days as you gauge, as supportable crusts will become unsupportable
earlier in the morning than on Thursday and Friday. The mid and high northerly slopes will start
to produce wet activity as they’ve been dampened by today’s heat and tonight’s
warm overnight temperatures. Expected
high rain/snow lines for Sunday/Monday’s weakening storm will likely spearhead
continued wet activity, particularly on the shady slopes. Timing will be everything this weekend. So will knowing when you’ve overstayed your
welcome on the steep soggy slopes. Once
things have gone off, take a hint and move to cooler aspects or the back nine
for the rest of the day. As always, be
especially careful under suspect glide crack terrain; commonly found in upper
Mill B South, Broad’s Fork, and Stairs Gulch.
Bottom Line:
Get off of, and out from underneath, steep slopes when you start to
sink into wet snow, especially in the heat of the afternoon. Tonight’s poor refreeze will initiate the wet
activity earlier in the morning, starting on east, then south, then west facing
slopes. Northerly facing slopes will
start to become active with wet activity as the snow surface becomes
increasingly damp.
Mountain Weather:
The current ridge high
pressure will start to break down and move off to the east ahead of a weakening
Low pressure system currently centered over
Announcements:
Click here to check out our new online avalanche
encyclopedia.
Click HERE for a text only version of the avalanche advisory.
UDOT also has a highway avalanche
control work hotline for Big Cottonwood, Little Cottonwood, and
Special announcement:
The
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.
We will update this advisory
again as conditions warrant.