Wasatch Cache and Uinta National Forests

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

Tri-City Performance, Polaris, the Utah Snowmobile Association, the National Weather Service, BRORA, and Backcountry Access.

Avalanche ADVISORY

sunDAY decemBER 3, 2006

The information in this advisory expires 24 hours after the date and time it’s issued, and will be updated Wednesday December 6, 2006.

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 Sunday, December 3, 2006 and it’s about 7:00 in the morning. Avalanche advisories for the western Uinta’s 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 801-231-2170, or email at [email protected] and fill me in with all the details.

Current Conditions:

Strengthening temperature inversions developed overnight and if you want warmer air… go higher. Current 8,000’ temperatures are still in negative territory, hovering around -6 degrees and at 10,000’ it’s a balmy 8 degrees. Winds are light and out of the northwest, blowing 5-15 mph along the ridges. Riding and turning conditions remain quite good despite the lack of snow. Upper elevation shady slopes offer cold settled powder on a mostly supportable base and average snow depths are 3’-4’ above 9,500’. I think Saturday’s strong sunshine was enough to put a zipper crust on south facing slopes offering a challenging exit on skis.

Avalanche Conditions:

Yesterday’s beautiful weather brought out the masses and with hundreds of volunteer slope stability testers stomping around, there was limited avalanche activity. Most folks reported sluffing within the new light density snow and some shallow soft slabs up to 8” deep on steep shady slopes at the upper elevations. I’ve got to think in most terrain the danger of slamming into a rock or other buried treasure probably outweighs the possibility of triggering an avalanche. However, as the saying goes- if you’re looking for an avalanche I bet you can find one. The most likely place to trigger a deeper slide today will be in steep rocky terrain with a shallow weak snowpack.

Bottom Line:

On most slopes throughout the range the avalanche danger is generally LOW.

However, at and above tree line there are pockets of MODERATE avalanche danger on slopes steeper than about 35 degrees facing the north half of the compass, especially those with both old and recent deposits of wind drifted snow. A MODERATE avalanche danger means human triggered avalanches are possible.

Mountain Weather:

High pressure moves into the region through Monday, giving us mostly sunny skies, light winds and warming temperatures. Highs today at 8,000’ will be near 30 degrees and at 10,000’ in the upper teens. Overnight lows dip into the mid teens. Winds will remain out of the northwest at speeds of 5-15 mph with an occasional gust in the upper 20’s along the highest ridges. Temperatures warm into the upper 30’s on Monday before a cold front slides into the area late Tuesday. We might squeak an inch or two of new snow out of this front, then back to high and dry weather for the foreseeable future.

Announcements:

The Moffit Peak weather station is being moved to a more representative location and we hope to have it up and running next week.

Free avalanche awareness classes are available. Give me a call at 801-231-2170 or email [email protected] and get one scheduled before the season gets too crazy!

 
If any terms confuse you, take a look at our new avalanche encyclopedia.

For avalanche photos click here.

General Information:

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’ll update this advisory by 7:30 am on Wednesday December 6, 2006.

This advisory is also available by calling 1-800-648-7433 or

1-888-999-4019.

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