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

wednesdAY december 28, 2005

This advisory expires 24 hours from the date and time posted, but will be updated by 7:30 am saturday December 31, 2005 or sooner if conditions warrant.

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 28, 2005 and it’s 7:00 a.m. Avalanche advisories for the western Uintas are available on Wednesday, Saturday, Sunday and all holidays.

This advisory covers the terrain from Daniels Summit, to Mirror Lake, to the North Slope of the western Uinta Mountains. That’s a lot of turf and I can’t be in all of these places at once. Your snow and avalanche observations are critical to this program and help to save other riders lives by getting accurate information out to the public. I’m interested in what you’re seeing especially if you see or trigger an avalanche. Please call 1-800-662-4140, or 801-231-2170, or email to [email protected] and fill us in with all the details.

Announcements:

A special thanks to Tri-City Performance, Polaris and The Utah Snowmobile Association for stepping up to the plate and partnering
to provide a new sled for this program. 
 
The Moffit Peak weather station is up and running. This site was made possible through generous donations
by BRORA, The Utah Snowmobile Association, and the National Weather Service. You can view data by clicking here.

For avalanche photos click here.

Current Conditions:

Clouds are beginning to thicken and both temperatures and winds have increased overnight, ahead of the next storm system moving into the area. It’s about 10 degrees warmer this morning than yesterday at this time. Currently, trailhead temperatures are in the low to mid 30’s and along the peaks it’s in the upper 20’s. Ridgetop winds are out of the west and northwest blowing 15-25 mph with an occasional gust in the low 30’s. No new snow has fallen in the past 24 hours, but Monday night’s storm deposited about 8”-10” of snow at the upper elevations throughout the range. Wind exposed locations have suffered some wind damage and this mornings temperatures are going to make the lower elevation snow damp and gloppy. The riding and turning conditions are still quite good though, on mid elevation protected shady slopes, where you’ll find creamy, settled powder.

Avalanche Conditions:

Yesterday’s field day brought me to the southern half of the range, riding out of Mill Hollow past Tower Mountain over to Current Creek. I’ve got to admit, I was somewhat surprised to find how well-behaved the new snow was. The only natural avalanche activity I saw were a few shallow wind drifts in steep wind loaded terrain and the slopes I stomped on, just yielded small stubborn pockets of wind slab about a foot deep. The healing process has started and recent warm temperatures have allowed the snowpack to gain more strength. I think triggering an avalanche within Monday night’s storm snow is going to become even more of a difficult task today. The new avalanche problem is going to be the fresh wind drifts formed by today’s strong winds, especially at upper elevations. Be alert for wind drifts forming on the leeward side of upper elevation ridges and around terrain features such as chutes and gullies. As the day wears on, drifting will become more widespread and the slabs will be more sensitive. Today’s avalanches should be manageable in size, but like always, think of the consequences of your terrain selection. Getting strained through a group of trees or carried over a cliff in an avalanche will definitely ruin your Christmas vacation.

Bottom Line:

In wind sheltered terrain, the avalanche danger is generally LOW on most slopes and human triggered avalanches are unlikely.

In the wind zone at upper elevations, above tree-line, the avalanche danger is MODERATE today on slopes steeper than about 35 degrees with recent deposits of wind drifted snow. A MODERATE avalanche danger means human triggered avalanches are possible.

Mountain Weather:

Warm moisture ahead of an approaching cold front will bring light snow showers to the region with 1”-3” of snow expected during the day. Snow levels will be rather high, near 8,000’, before dropping tonight as the cold air settles in. Highs today at 8,000’ will be near 40 degrees and at 10,000’ in the low 30’s. Overnight, temperatures will drop into the low 20’s. Winds are expected to be blowing out of the southwest at speeds of 20-30 mph along the ridges. The cold front arrives around midnight, dropping temperatures and snow levels. It looks like we should get 4”-8” of snow overnight, with another 2”-4” on Thursday in a moist northwesterly flow. We’ll see a break in the action on Friday and another colder system should slide into the area late Saturday afternoon. It looks like a storm every two days into the middle of next week!

General Information:

If you haven’t taken one of our free snowmobile specific avalanche awareness classes, schedule one now before things get too crazy. Give me a call at 801-231-2170 and I’d be happy to tailor a talk for your group.

Also, once there’s enough snow, I’ll have the “Beacon Basin” training site up and running again this year at the Nobletts trailhead.

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 expires 24 hours from the date and time posted, but will be updated by 7:30 am on Saturday December 31, 2005 or sooner if conditions warrant.

Thanks for calling!