Avalanche Advisory
Advisory: Salt Lake Area Mountains Issued by Greg Gagne for Friday - April 29, 2016 - 6:03pm
bottom line

We customarily do not issue danger ratings at this point in the season, but rather provide snow and general avalanche information and weather forecasts.

For Saturday and Sunday, dangerous avalanche conditions may exist due to (1) loose wet avalanches as well as (2) damp or wet slabs as the snow warms. The warming of the snow can occur with direct sun, but also with overcast skies due to greenhousing. Both loose wet as well as wet slab avalanches can be managed by using early starts and finishes to avoid the effects of heating. Once you see visible signs such as rollerballs or wet, sloppy snow, it is time to get off of and out from underneath any steep slopes. The Wasatch mountains - particularly Little Cottonwood Canyon - received a significant amount of new snow this week, so avalanches have the potential to be large and run long distances.

Closed ski areas are no longer doing any control work, and travel should be treated no differently than skiing the backcountry. This photo was taken at the base of Alta Ski Area this past week.
special announcement

This is the last advisory for the 2015/16 season and will cover Saturday April 30 and Sunday May 1. We will post an end of season message the week of May 1.

We will continue to post observations as we receive them over the next few weeks. We may also update conditions via Twitter or Instagram. If you see anything you feel we should know about, please submit an observation.
current conditions

It has been quite a stormy week. According to Jim Steenburgh's infamous "Wasatch Weather Weenies" site, in terms of water, the week of April 25 was the biggest storm cycle of the season with nearly 4.5" of water equivalent at the Snowbird SNOTEL site:
recent activity

The abundant storm snow over the past week resulted in numerous human-triggered and natural avalanches, with Wednesday April 27 a particularly active day.

Thanks to everyone who is continuing to send in observations. Click HERE for the complete avalanche list, which gets updated each day.

We received one observation showing a graph of accident and avalanche occurrences in 2016 using reports from the UAC site. This data is incomplete, but it does highlight that Wednesday April 27th was an especially active day for reported avalanches, although I suspect there were many more than nine avalanches that occurred that day. The full observation can be found HERE.
Avalanche Problem 1
type aspect/elevation characteristics
LIKELIHOOD
LIKELY
UNLIKELY
SIZE
LARGE
SMALL
TREND
INCREASING DANGER
SAME
DECREASING DANGER
over the next 24 hours
description

Although the weekend weather mountain weather forecast calls for partly to mostly cloudy skies and somewhat cool temperatures, any period of warming will trigger loose wet sluffs at all aspects and elevations. Given the large amounts of storm snow we have received this past week, these slides may be significant entraining a large amount of snow and running long distances.

Avalanche Problem 2
type aspect/elevation characteristics
LIKELIHOOD
LIKELY
UNLIKELY
SIZE
LARGE
SMALL
TREND
INCREASING DANGER
SAME
DECREASING DANGER
over the next 24 hours
description

Many observations from this past week reported several different layers within the storm snow including graupel and density changes. These layers were active during the midweek stormy period, but have settled out since. However, once the sun does come out, damp slabs and/or wet slabs will be possible on all aspects and elevations as the snow heats. These slides have the potential to be large and run long distances.
weather

Partly to mostly cloud skies are expected over the weekend with overnight temperatures in the 20's, and rising into the 30's and 40's during the daytime. Winds will be light to moderate and out of the north/northeast. Upper elevations may pick up a trace to even a few inches of snow on Saturday and Sunday.
general announcements

GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENTS

GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENTS

Remember your information can save lives. If you see anything we should know about, please help us out by submitting snow and avalanche conditions. You can also call us at 801-524-5304, email by clicking HERE, or include #utavy in your tweet or Instagram.

To get help in an emergency (to request a rescue) in the Wasatch, call 911.  Be prepared to give your GPS coordinates or the run name. Dispatchers have a copy of the Wasatch Backcountry Ski map.

Backcountry Emergencies. It outlines your step-by-step method in the event of a winter backcountry incident.

If you trigger an avalanche in the backcountry, but no one is hurt and you do not need assistance, please notify the nearest ski area dispatch to avoid a needless response by rescue teams. Thanks.

EMAIL ADVISORY  If you would like to get the daily advisory by email you will need to subscribe here.  

DAWN PATROL Hotline updated daily by 5-530am - 888-999-4019 option 8.

TWITTER Updates for your mobile phone - DETAILS

UDOT canyon closures:  LINK TO UDOT, or on Twitter, follow @UDOTavy, @CanyonAlerts or @AltaCentral

Utah Avalanche Center mobile app - Get your advisory on your iPhone along with great navigation and rescue tools.

Powderbird Helicopter Skiing - Blog/itinerary for the day  

Lost or Found something in the backcountry? - http://nolofo.com/

Ski Utah mobile snow updates

To those skinning uphill at resorts:  it is critical to know the resort policy on uphill travel.  You can see the uphill travel policy for each resort here. 

Benefit the Utah Avalanche Center when you shop from Backcountry.com or REI:  Click this link for Backcountry.com or this link to REI, shop, and they will donate a percent of your purchase price to the UAC.  Both offer free shipping (with some conditions) so this costs you nothing!

Benefit the Utah Avalanche Center when you buy or sell on ebay - set the Utah Avalanche Center as a favorite non-profit in your ebay account here and click on ebay gives when you buy or sell.  You can choose to have your seller fees donated to the UAC, which doesn't cost you a penny.

This information does not apply to developed ski areas or highways where avalanche control is normally done.  This advisory is from the U.S.D.A. Forest Service, which is solely responsible for its content. This advisory describes general avalanche conditions and local variations always exist.