Wasatch Cache and Uinta National Forests

In partnership with: Forest Service Utah Avalanche Center, The Friends of the Utah Avalanche Center and Utah State Parks.

Avalanche ADVISORY

Good morning. This is Craig Gordon with the Forest Service Utah Avalanche Center with your avalanche and mountain weather advisory for the western Uinta Mountains. Today is Wednesday, December 10, 2003 and it’s 7:30 a.m.

Current conditions:

Under mostly cloudy skies temperatures are about 10 degrees warmer than yesterday morning and currently it’s in the low 20’s at 10,000’. Southerly winds are on the rise as well with hourly averages in the 20’s and gusts in the 40’s along the upper elevation ridgelines. Snow totals from the Sunday/Monday storm are in the 12”-18” range throughout the region with Upper Chalk Creek and Whitney Basin receiving the bulk of the storm. Excellent riding and turning conditions can be found especially on mid and upper elevation north facing, wind-sheltered slopes.

Avalanche Conditions:

The weekend storm system was ushered in with strong and variable winds, which loaded slopes of all aspects, particularly in the wind zone above timberline. As a result, a number of steep upper elevation slopes throughout the range experienced a natural avalanche cycle. While not widespread and pockety in nature, the common theme in these slides is they’re occurring in steep rocky terrain with a shallow, weak snowpack. Yesterday my partner and I were finding the snowpack had adjusted to the weight of the new storm and the pack felt pretty much, glued in place.

Today, however the avalanche danger will be changing, as strong winds will be forming a whole new batch of wind slabs. I’d be suspicious of steep, leeward terrain near ridgelines and around terrain features such as chutes, gullies, and sub-ridges. The additional weight of wind transported snow in combination with a trigger such as a skier or snowmobiler may be enough to tip the scales. On slopes that didn’t avalanche earlier in the week this would result in a larger and more dangerous slide than you might expect. If you’re getting into steep, wind-loaded terrain today be on the lookout for the telltale signs of instability such as cracking and collapsing of the snowpack.

Bottom Line:

The avalanche danger is MODERATE this morning on steep mid and upper elevation slopes with recent deposits of wind-drifted snow. Human triggered avalanches are possible. With strong winds on tap for today be aware the avalanche danger could rapidly rise to CONSIDERABLE. This means that human triggered avalanches are likely and natural avalanches are possible.

At lower elevations and in wind sheltered terrain the avalanche is generally LOW. Both human triggered and natural avalanches are unlikely.

Mountain Weather:

A low-pressure system will slowly works its way into the region today and we can expect light snowfall developing by late this afternoon. It’s a short-lived event and things should be winding down after midnight. Storm totals look to be in the 3”-6” range. Temperatures will be fairly mild with highs at 8,000’ in the lower 30’s and at 10,000’ in the low to mid 20’s. Overnight lows will be near 20 degrees. Winds will be out of the southwest during the day switching to west by early evening and will remain fairly strong throughout the period. Another storm system will move into the region on Thursday bringing in colder temperatures and light snow showers that should linger into Friday morning. Saturday we should see a bit of a break and the jury’s still out on the Sunday storm.

General Information:

We can always use snow and avalanche information and your observations are an important component to this program. So if you see or trigger an avalanche give us a call at 801-231-2170 or 1-800-662-4140.

Also, if you’d like to schedule a free avalanche awareness talk and/or field day give us a call at 801-524-5304.

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.

This advisory will be updated by 7:30 a.m. on Saturday morning.

Thanks for calling.