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
“keeping
you on top”
AVALANCHE ADVISORY
Friday,
December 22, 2006 7:30 am
Good morning, this is Bruce Tremper with
the
Current Conditions:
Light snow is falling
in the mountains and we are expecting 3-6 inches of snow today, just to freshen things up.
Temperatures this morning are fairly warm, in the mid 20’s. Ridge top winds are southwest and not
particularly strong, around 15 mph and 20 mph on the highest peaks. There is a wide variety of old snow surfaces
with old, wind slabs above tree line, sun crusts on all the sun exposed slopes
and still some nice, soft, recrystallized snow on the slopes that face the
north half of the compass down out of the wind zones. In shallow snowpack areas, there is weak, sugary
snow all the way to the ground. As
usual, our hard-working and creative, Brett Kobernik came through again. He put together a wonderful synopsis
of the season’s weather and avalanche conditions up to this point. Check it
out.
Snowpack and Avalanche Conditions:
I don’t think we are
going to get enough new snow to change the avalanche conditions very much. But still, the main concern for the day is
the new snow and any wind drifting of the new snow. Watch out for the winds to kick up as the
trough passes at mid day and also watch for increasing northerly winds on
Saturday. If any wind drifting occurs,
they will be deposited on top of some very weak snow on the surface right now. This means that any wind slabs created today
will be especially sensitive. These
avalanches may easily step down to deeper weak layers.
Bottom Line for the
The avalanche danger is
generally LOW today but will likely rise to MODERATE in areas with recent deposits of wind drifted snow.
Mountain Weather:
Unfortunately, the
system today is rather weak and splitting, so I’m not expecting much snow,
probably 3-6 inches. This system is not
a cold front, but just a passing trough, so temperatures will not drop very
much as it passes but the ridge top winds will shift from the southwest to the
northwest by tonight and to the north on Saturday. The winds are supposed to remain fairly
reasonable at not much more than 20 mph.
Ridge top temperature will remain around 20 degrees.
For the extended forecast, we have a stronger, colder and windier storm on
Sunday, just in time to freshen things up for your new toys on Christmas day. Then it looks like another shot of snow on
about Tuesday.
Announcements:
Yesterday, the Wasatch Powderbird Guides flew in Mineral,
Listen to the
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We appreciate any snowpack
and avalanche observations you have, so please leave us a message at (801)
524-5304 or 1-800-662-4140, or email us at [email protected].
(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.
Brett Kobernik will
update this advisory by 7:30 on Saturday morning, and thanks for calling.