Avalanche forecast

Uintas

Utah Avalanche Center
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Avalanche danger

  • Alpine
  • Treeline
  • Below treeline
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Out of date — this forecast expired 8 months ago. You’re viewing past conditions, not the current bulletin.

Highlights

Strong winds blowing from the southwest elevate today's avalanche danger on upper elevation slopes to CONSIDERABLE, where human-triggered avalanches are LIKELY. Once triggered, today's wind-drifts can step-down, breaking 2-4 feet deep and failing into persistent weak layers buried near the ground.

For the best riding, I am avoiding the windzone and setting my sights on wind-sheltered, low-angle, north-facing slopes less than 30° with no overhead hazard.

Avalanche problems

  • Persistent Slabs

    • Alpine
    • Treeline
    • Below treeline
    Likelihood
    Possible
    Size
    2

    The last reported persistent slab avalanche occurred over a week ago, and details can be found, here. It is becoming increasingly difficult to trigger an avalanche that fails into old, faceted snow near the ground, but recent snow stability tests and overall poor structure indicate that it is still a player. What's concerning is that we're not seeing or experiencing many red flags or warning signs like cracking or collapsing, and the snowpack feels solid under our rigs or skis when we are riding. This is especially tricky because we could put 100 sled tracks on a slope without any consequence, but all the 101st rider needs to do is find a shallow point in the snowpack around a bush, rock, or noticeably thin spot where you can affect the weak layer. This is why tracks on a slope do not mean it's safe when dealing with today's avalanche dragon.

    Persistent slabs are tricky and not manageable with a ski or side-hill sled cut. Instead, avoidance is the go-to tool and should be practiced often.

    When getting into the blueprints of the snowpack, we have to keep it simple. The biggest warning sign in the photo above is poor structure. We have a dense, strong slab sitting over weak faceted snow near the ground, and that is enough evidence to steer me away from any steep slopes that may have this setup.

  • Wind Slabs

    • Alpine
    • Treeline
    • Below treeline
    Likelihood
    Likely
    Size
    1

    Sustained winds blowing from the southwest averaging between 20 and 30 MPH, gusting into the 50's loaded mid and upper elevations leeward slopes facing northwest through southeast. Here, fresh, dense wind-drifts 6-12" deep sit above a variety of interfaces, including facets, rime, crusts, and old decomposing snow. My greatest concern is where fresh drifts have overloaded old, faceted snow near the ground, and once triggered, will turn a relatively small and manageable avalanche into a deep, and potentially life-threatening slide.

    Im avoiding fat, rounded pillows that look textured or may sound hollow like a drum under my ride on specific terrain features like convex rolls, chutes, gully walls, and cut banks. And as always, keep an eye on ever-growing cornices as they may be extra sensitive today, break back further than you might expect.

Recent Activity

No new avalanche activity has been reported in the past 24 hours, but check out some travel observations and old avalanches by clicking on the button below.

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Snow and Weather

Nowcast - The Uinta weather network is back up and running this morning, just in time for incoming weather. As of 0500 AM, mostly cloudy skies are paired with warm trailhead temperatures ahead of the storm, in the low 30's, while upper elevation stations average around 25°F. Up high, winds crank from the southwest in the 20's with gusts surpassing 50MPH at some stations, bringing windchill temperatures down into the single digits.

Forecast - Expect the weather to deteriorate as the day progresses, but the storm system should arrive just after breakfast. Temperatures remain in the 20's while southwesterly winds continue blowing strong, in the 20-30 MPH range, gusting into the 40's. Expect the rain/snow line to start around 7,000' with accumulation becoming noticeable early this afternoon. By sunset, I am hopeful we could see 3-5" on the ground at upper elevations.

Futurecast - Snow continues through tomorrow into Monday. The Uintas are looking at a real good shot of snow and water here, and with some luck, we might squeeze out 12-14" of snow with over 1" of snow water equivalent. Major accumulations tail off Monday night, but things continue to look active throughout the week.

Travel Conditions - In general, travel in the Uintas is decent with supportable snow depths ranging from 2-4'. The Christmas Eve raincrust keeps us off the ground, bridging the gap between trees, rocks, stumps, and good powder riding. Upper elevation slopes on the north half of the compass continue to hold the best snow, while sunny, solar aspects are wind stripped and very thin. My greatest concern aside from avalanches is smoking my sled or skis off of rocks, stumps, or trees, anything underneath our shallow snowpack that could bring my season to a quick end. And yes, SR-35 is still open to Wolf Creek Pass.

From glassy tree branches to a crispy snow surface, certain parts of the range got stuck in the clouds and saw a decent riming event (photo via Trevor K)!

Additional Info

There is no better time to take any avalanche course than now! Whether you sled, ski, board or snow angel, we have a class for you. Reach out to us to get into an avalanche course that fits you best, or get your riding crew together and lets set-up a private day on snow!

Click here for a list of courses!

Students in a Sled Backcountry 101 coursed working on their pit craftmanship and learning how to properly perform an ECT test and how to communicate those results.

There is no better way to learn about avalanches than investigating avalanches! Students from a recent course take a look at an old human triggered avalanches and try to put the pieces together to understand what happened.

General Announcements

We have some upcoming classes and events that we'd be stoked to see you at -- Please reach out with any questions and check out below for more details!

See All Courses & Events Here

We are always looking for snow and avalanche observations or just general riding conditions. Reach out to us with questions, concerns, or if you see anything in your travels! Contact us directly through the info below:

This forecast is from the U.S.D.A. Forest Service, which is solely responsible for its content. This forecast describes general avalanche conditions, and local variations always occur. This forecast was issued on Sunday, January 4th at 0500 AM and expires 24 hours after it was issued. We'll update this information by 07:00 AM tomorrow.

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