Heads up... let's not lose our minds today over some fresh snow and bright sunshine. We've got the perfect setup for avalanches to break on weak snow near the ground, resulting in a dangerously large slide that will instantly ruin your day.
In upper elevation terrain in the wind zone, deceptively tricky avalanche conditions exist on steep, wind drifted slopes, especially those with an easterly component to its aspect. You'll find HIGH avalanche danger in terrain with these characteristics and human triggered avalanches are VERY LIKELY.
In addition, recent winds drifted snow onto steep, leeward, mid elevation slopes where a CONSIDERABLE avalanche danger exists and human triggered avalanches are LIKELY. Once triggered, today's drifts may break deeper and wider than you might expect.
Just the shear amount of new snow warrants an honrable mention on steep, lower elevation terrain where a MODERATE avalanche danger is foundand human triggered slides and sluffs are possible.
Sure it's getting sketchy out there, but it doesn't mean we can't ride. We simply need to stay off of and out from under steep, wind drifted slopes and head to big open meadows.
We've had a lot of new snow this week and now its stacking up around our trailheads and at lower elevations. Remember... even if you're headed out for a trail run, snowshoe, dog walk, or family sled adventure, be aware of steep slopes above and adjacent to where you're playing and avoid terrain traps like gullies and streambeds.
The most in-your-face avalanche problem for today are fresh drifts.
Fact is, winds have blown in the 40's and 50's for days and they've been all over the map, loading terrain in unusual locations and depositing snow further down-slope than we usually expect to see. Yep... winds changed the landscape and have created tricky avalanche conditions. With all the great riding right now there's no reason to pull on the dogs tail today, because once initiated, today's drifts will break deeper and wider than you might expect, creating a slide that quickly gets out of hand. Your best bet for avoidance is to simply steer clear of any fat, rounded piece of snow, especially if it sounds hollow like a drum.
Here's Ted's take on his snowpit stability test... "On this northeast facing slope near 10,000' in elevation, I was able to get full propagation with 9 taps from the elbow on a column of snow on some buried faceted snow near the middle of the snow pack. I would suspect that this new load may test the strength of these weak layers."
Recent storm snow and water are starting to stack up and yesterday's strong winds along with continued snowfall is beginning to wake up some of our persistent weak layers buried in the mid portion of our snowpack. As as a matter of fact, I think in some zones that have a thin snowpack, especially terrain that avalanched earlier this year, we might be teetering on the edge.
Making matters more complicated than unusual is... we've got persistent weaknesses on all aspects of the compass, particularly in upper elevation terrain. And the bottom line is... anything persistent in our pack is tricky, can take long periods of time to heal, and our usual bag of tricks observations, particularly when we don't see avalanche activity, often suggest false green light conditions. So that means, you can ride some slopes and be good to go, while others just wait for us to roll along and knock the legs out from underneath. And here's the danger... once initiated, avalanches have a distinct possibility of breaking much deeper and wider than you might expect.
Our snowpack is beginning to reveal its weak cards. With a little coercing, this nicely connected, hard wind slab broke into weak snow near the ground, on a steep, upper elevation, northeast aspect in the wind zone.
To view additional trip reports and recent avalanche activity, simply click here.
Currently-
One last gasp from yesterday's storm delivered an additional 4" of medium density snow across the range. Under clearing skies, temperatures cratered overnight and currently register right around zero degrees. West and southwest winds relaxed slightly overnight, yet still blow in the 20's and 30's along the high ridges. Riding and turning conditions are about as good as they get, but you'll need to seek out wind sheltered terrain today where you'll be rewarded with deep, cold, creamy snow.
Uinta weather network info is found here. Simply click on the Western Uinta tab.
For today-
It'll be a stunning day with sunny skies and temperatures climbing into the 30's. Southwest winds remain reasonable, blowing in the 20's and 30's along the ridges.
Futurecast-
Expect a break for today into Thursday, with another storm slated for late Thursday/Friday. STRONG SOUTHWEST WINDS and a significant warming trend are expected into Thursday. The next round of snow comes Thursday night into Friday morning.
Ted was out and about along the Mirror Lake Highway yesterday and reports ridiculously deep, over-the-hood conditions. More on Ted's travels nd trip report found here.
The information in this forecast expires in 24 hours, but will be updated by 7:00 AM Thursday Jan. 16th.
This forecast is updated daily by 7:00 AM.
In the mean-time, if you see or trigger an avalanche or just wanna let me know what you're seeing you can reach me directly at 801-231-2170
It'll be a minute or two before we're riding, but while you're waiting....
This is a great time of year to schedule one of our free avy awareness presentations.
You can email me directly [email protected]
The information in this forecast is from the US Forest Service which is solely responsible for its content.
