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, January 21, 2004 and it’s 7:30 a.m. Backcountry Awareness Week begins on January 19^th and runs through the 25^th. There are some great events scheduled for the upcoming week and you can read all about it at http://www.backcountryawareness.com/

Current conditions:

Temperatures crashed last night under clearing skies and currently it’s near 10 degrees at most mountain top locations. Winds are light and generally out of the east and northeast, blowing at speeds of 5-10 mph along the ridges. We’ve received a trace of new snow in the past 24 hours and while many of the more popular areas are tracked out, you can still find patches of recrystalized powder on shady, wind-sheltered slopes.

Avalanche Conditions:

There’s just not a whole lot going on in the avalanche world at the moment and now I know what the Maytag repairman feels like. With a mostly stable snowpack in place, it’s a waiting game until the next storm arrives. When will it get stormy again? Funny you should ask because the computer models are starting to get excited about a change in the weather occurring sometime late Saturday. So in anticipation, the next couple of days would be perfect not only for exploring new terrain but also to see how weak the surface snow has grown in the past two weeks. In addition to this concern, in terrain where snow depths are shallow, the snowpack is losing strength near the ground as well. Mentally mapping out where this weak snow is most prominent may give you a leg up on the pattern of snow stability when winter finally returns.

Bottom Line:

At all elevations the avalanche danger is generally LOW today. Human triggered avalanches are unlikely.

Mountain Weather:

A dry and stable northerly flow will be over the area through Friday giving us clear skies and slightly warming temperatures each day. Highs today at 10,000’ will be in the low 20’s and at 8,000’ close to 29 degrees. Overnight lows will be near 10 degrees. Winds will be light and out of the north through northeast at speeds of 5-10 mph along the upper elevation ridgelines. For the future, the computer models continue to indicate a big pattern change for the upcoming weekend. While it’s too early to nail down any snow totals, confidence is building for a vigorous cold front to move into the region late Saturday and stick around through about Tuesday. I’ll have a better handle on this system for Saturday’s advisory and we’ll keep you posted as the storm develops.

General Information:

We can always use snow and avalanche information and your snowpack and avalanche observations could help to save someone’s life. 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.

I will update this advisory by 7:30 a.m. on Saturday, Jan. 24, 2004.

Thanks for calling.