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

saturDAY january 13, 2007

The information in this advisory expires 24 hours after the date and time it’s issued, but will be updated with on Sunday January 14, 2007.

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 Saturday, January 13, 2007 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 and are brought to you in partnership with Utah State Parks and Recreation.

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.

Come join us for a star studded fundraising ride on Saturday Jan. 27^th. Click here for more details or call 801-963-3819.

We’ll be installing Beacon Basin this morning at the Noblett’s Trailhead at 9:30 and could use a few extra hands. If you wanna loosen your back up

and keep warm while you’re waiting for your buddy, swing on by and lend a hand!

Current Conditions:

The stormy period the past few days has been good to the Uinta’s and new snow totals stack up like this- about a foot on the North Slope, 7” at Trial Lake and in terrain around the Daniel’s area, and 5” at the trailheads. The big winner is the east side of the range where nearly 16” of new snow fell at the upper elevations. Snow densities averaged 3%, which is about as light as it gets around here; unfortunately the new snow is so light you’re still feeling the rock hard crusts and old, bone jarring tracks underneath. Low angle slopes may offer more cushion. Even under cloudy skies current temperatures are Montana-like. At 10,000’ it’s -11 degrees and -9 degrees at the trailhead elevations. Winds are light, less than 10 mph and generally out of the north. Even with light winds it’ll be brutally cold today, so keep an eye on your partner for frostbite.

Avalanche Conditions:

Today’s avalanche problems are pretty straight forward even though we’ve received a decent amount of new snow. First off, the storm snow has very little water weight, so it’s incredibly light in density and isn’t adding much additional stress to the snowpack. Secondly, there was hardly any wind associated with the storm so in most terrain there’s really no slab to speak of. However, where the winds may have been stronger is along the highest peaks and ridges and there you’ll find manageable soft slabs, predictably breaking around you rather than above you. If you’re getting into steep, upper elevation terrain today, tweak small test slopes similar is aspect, elevation and slope angle to see how they’re reacting before committing to a big line.

In general, today’s biggest concern is going to be new snow sluffing on steep slopes. While relatively benign, the right combination of light snow, a steep slope and a hard slick bed surface underneath will enable you to entrain more snow, creating a larger sluff than you might expect. So take care that one of these doesn’t get out of hand and take you for a ride over a cliff of bury you in a gully. Well placed slope cuts and sluff management will be good defensive measures in steep terrain.

Bottom Line:

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

In non-wind affected terrain the avalanche danger is generally LOW.

Mountain Weather:

Mostly cloudy skies, light snow and cold temperatures are on tap today as a portion of the cold trough out of Canada moves into the region. Highs at 10,000’ will be near zero and at 8,000’ close to 5 degrees. Overnight lows dive into negative territory again, right around -20 degrees. Winds should remain light and northerly, blowing 5-15 mph with an occasional gust in the low 20’s along the highest ridges. We might be able to squeak an additional 1”-3” of snow out of this system before it moves east, signaling the beginning of clearing skies and a slow warming trend. Sunday should be partly cloudy with highs around 10 degrees and Monday we should see highs in the upper teens. Another storm may be shaping up for the end of the week.

Announcements:

Come join us for a star studded fundraising ride on Saturday Jan. 27^th. Click here for more details.

I want to thank the crew at Tri-City Performance in Springville along with Polaris and the Utah Snowmobile Association for partnering with the avalanche center and stepping up to the plate by providing a new sled for this season! Click here, to see the new ride!

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 Sunday January 14, 2007.

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

1-888-999-4019.

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