Avalanche forecast

Salt River and Wyoming Ranges

Bridger-Teton Avalanche Center
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Avalanche danger

Mon
Alpine
3 · Considerable
Treeline
2 · Moderate
Below
2 · Moderate
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Out of date — this forecast expired 3 years ago. You’re viewing past conditions, not the current bulletin.

Highlights

Multiple days of snowfall and wind make for dangerous avalanche conditions. Watch for thin, rocky areas and wind-affected snow. Numerous large avalanches have occurred in this zone over the past storm cycle. Choosing lower slope angles is the best way to manage the avalanche hazard and enjoy the fresh snow today. 

Avalanche problems

  • Persistent Slabs

    • Alpine
    • Treeline
    • Below treeline
    Likelihood
    Possible
    Size
    1.5–2.5

    Recent snowfall and wind continue to stress weaker snow around 2-4+ feet deep. Assume this snow exists on most east, north, and west-facing slopes. In the last few days, these weak layers have received a large increase in loading. The recent clear weather revealed avalanches on both layers and human-triggered activity occurred yesterday. Your weight may more easily impact them at middle or lower elevations where the slab is thinner in rocky areas. It isn't easy to know how thick the snowpack is on a given slope, so consider your terrain choices carefully. Safer travel options always exist by sticking to slopes less than ~30 degrees without steep slopes above you. Though the likelihood of triggering is trending downward, the possibility (and consequences) have remained the same.

    Avoiding terrain where both of these problems overlap will be key.

    (2/17/2024)

    This large avalanche was triggered by the second rider on a slope up Sheep Creek in the Snake River Range at 9,500 feet on an E aspect.

  • Wind Slabs

    • Alpine
    • Treeline
    • Below treeline
    Likelihood
    Likely
    Size
    1–2

    New snow and wind equal more weight on various weak layers in the snowpack. This stress is amplified in areas where dense, thick wind slabs have formed during recent strong winds. Smaller wind slab avalanches have the potential to step down to more deeply buried weak layers. This could result in a larger avalanche, which is why they are a secondary concern to the problem above, but still something to watch out for while moving in the mountains today.  

    Small, fresh wind slabs may build throughout the day today along exposed ridges and in cross-loaded gullies as well as lower on slopes. Cracks shooting from your boards or sled indicate that you’ve found a sensitive slab. 

    (2/18/2024)

    The visual ripples in the snow surface and old drifted-in avalanche crown illustrate where some areas saw more wind, and any drifted or winded snow holds a higher potential for triggering an avalanche. 

    Photo: Gabrielle Antonioli

Avalanche Discussion

At the risk of undermining any notion of expertise you may think I possess, I've made plenty of bad decisions in avalanche terrain. I'm eternally skeptical of myself. Not to a paralyzing point, but I think about how I think about everything a lot. We are all fallible. The current avalanche scenario has very low feedback and is variable across locations in the zone. You may not receive any signs a slope is unstable, even after multiple tracks on a slope.  How else does one receive feedback when the environment doesn't provide it? Trenching in your track, digging, and probing will add some data points to your slope-by-slope feedback. In the Greys Zone, I've found snowpack depths ranging from 12 inches to over 4 feet deep over the past week. The differences between sections of this zone are worth getting to know closely.  With any snowpack, it's very important to recognize when you are dealing with a more complex problem than we as humans can typically fully understand.   Hopefully, we’ll have more evidence to pull from after this series of storms. I say “hopefully” because there’s an overarching "I guess we’ll wait and see if certain things avalanche naturally or not," while bearing in mind that even covering miles upon miles on a sled throughout a day, we still see such a small portion of a mountain range and what has avalanched for feedback in a cycle. Pad any uncertainty you have today by building a wide buffer zone for error in your travel practices.

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