Avalanche Advisory
Advisory: Uintas Area Mountains Issued by Craig Gordon for Monday - April 2, 2018 - 3:01am
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In a sea of generally LOW avalanche danger, there's an isolated, or MODERATE danger of triggering a deep, dangerous dry snow avalanche. The usual suspects include- steep, rocky terrain facing the north half of the compass, especially slopes with a thin, weak snowpack. Human triggered avalanches are POSSIBLE in terrain with these kind of characteristics.
special announcement

Next Sunday April 8th will be the last of the regularly scheduled advisories for the western Uinta Mountains.
current conditions

A fast moving cold front is racing towards the region. Ahead of this feature, clouds are increasing, southwest winds blow 40-60 mph along the high ridges, and temperatures hover near freezing. Riding and turning conditions are aspect dependant and may be a bit underwhelming today. South facing slopes offer smooth, suportable, corn-like conditions that, with lack of strong springtime sun, may be late to soften today. Whilst on the other half of the compass, a few patches of soft shallow snow are found on upper elevation wind sheltered, shady slopes.

Above are 24 hour temperatures and snow depth in Upper Moffit Basin along with winds and temperatures from Windy Peak. More remote Uinta weather stations are found here

A great body of recent trip reports, observations, and snow data here.

recent activity


This slide triggered yesterday in Timberlakes knocked the legs out from under a large piece of corni, which then released a fresh slab on a heavily wind drifted, east facing slope. Certainly big enough to roll a rider. Thanks Jess for the info!

A full list of recent avalanches is found here.
Avalanche Problem 1
type aspect/elevation characteristics
LIKELIHOOD
LIKELY
UNLIKELY
SIZE
LARGE
SMALL
TREND
INCREASING DANGER
SAME
DECREASING DANGER
over the next 24 hours
description

We haven't heard of any avalanche activity breaking to deeply buried weak layers since last Saturday and that's good news. Of course, last weekends cold snap helped weld the snowpack in place and where the pack is deep, it's happy in its own skin. For the most part, I think these instabilities have gone dormant for the moment. However, I'm not ready to let my guard down where the pack has remained thin and weak all year. Prime suspects include steep, rocky, upper elevation terrain facing the north half of the compass, along with slopes that already avalanched this season.
weather

Under mostly cloudy skies, southwest winds crank into the 50's and 60's along the high ridges. Temperatures rise into the mid 30's and dip into the 20's overnight after the cold front arrives. Not much in the way of moisture, but maybe we squeak a couple inches out of this "storm" before high pressure builds for midweek. A promising looking storm develops for late in the week.

general announcements

The information in this advisory expires 24 hours after the date and time posted, but will be updated by 7:00 AM Tuesday April 3rd, 2018.

If you're getting out and about, please let me know what you're seeing especially if you see or trigger and avalanche. I can be reached at [email protected] or 801-231-2170

It's also a good time to set up one of our very popular avalanche awareness classes. Reach out to me and I'll make it happen.

This information does not apply to developed ski areas or highways where avalanche control is normally done. This advisory is from the U.S.D.A. Forest Service, which is solely responsible for its content. This advisory describes general avalanche conditions and local variations always occur.