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, March 3, 2004 and it’s 7:30 a.m.

Current conditions:

Under mostly cloudy skies, 10,000’ temperatures are in the mid teens, and light snow is falling as a weak system brushes by the region. Winds are light, generally out of the west, blowing at speeds of 5-15 mph along the ridges. The combination of sun and warm temperatures has crusted the sun-exposed slopes and down low even the shady aspects are a little damp. However, up high the snow is still cold, light, and fluffy and excellent riding and turning conditions will be found on sheltered slopes.

Avalanche Conditions:

The snowpack appears to be getting more comfortable to all the added weight slammed down on top of it during last weeks ferocious storm. I haven’t heard of or seen any recent avalanche activity in our neck of the woods, though in the central Wasatch Mountains it’s been a different story. Yesterday a couple of folks were able to trigger pockets of hard slab, 1’-3’ deep, on steep, wind-loaded slopes. While there were a few surprises, fortunately, everyone came home safe.

Closer to home, people are slowly nosing into steeper terrain without incident, though I don’t think I’d allow a set of tracks to be my barometer of slope stability. Although it may be increasingly difficult to trigger an avalanche the consequences far outweigh the rewards. Talking with other avalanche professionals in the region, the gut feeling is we don’t quite trust the snowpack just yet. The reason being is the weak snow developed during the January dry spell tends to be notoriously tricky. Instabilities such as these allow you to get well out onto the slope before it fails and when it does you’re confronted with a large avalanche. Since we don’t have x-ray vision it’s going to be hard to detect where these weaknesses lay in the snowpack. Your best bet today is to tone down your slope angles and carefully evaluate each slope on an individual basis.

At mid and lower elevations the surface snow is getting damp and the high angle of the sun is starting to effect even the north facing slopes. Should the sun come out in earnest today or if there are thin clouds, steep sunny slopes may experience the usual round of wet sluffs. As always you should avoid steep sun-exposed slopes during the heat of the day.

Bottom Line:

The avalanche danger is “SCARY” MODERATE today at and above timberline on northwest through east facing slopes steeper than about 35 degrees. Large, dangerous, human triggered avalanches are possible.

At all elevations the avalanche danger will be rising to MODERATE with daytime heating on all steep, sun exposed slopes.

On slopes less than 30 degrees in steepness the avalanche danger is generally LOW.

Mountain Weather:

After a couple of morning flurries, skies should begin to clear and we should see partly cloudy skies in the next couple of hours. High temperatures at the upper elevations will be in the mid teens and at 8,000’ in the low 30’s. Overnight lows will be near 15 degrees. Winds will be light and westerly, blowing in the 5-15 mph range along the ridges. Thursday looks to be breezy with a chance of snow developing, though snow totals will only be a couple of inches. The computer models have been inconsistent with weather for the upcoming weekend. As it stands right now an unsettled pattern seems to be in store for us with no major storms in sight.

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, Mar.6, 2004.

Thanks for calling.