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Forecast for the Salt Lake Area Mountains

Drew Hardesty
Issued by Drew Hardesty on
Wednesday morning, November 20, 2024
You can trigger trigger soft slab avalanches today, primarily in the higher elevation bands. The most likely place to trigger a 10"-18" deep and up to 50' wide soft slab avalanche is in freshly wind drifted terrain on the north and east side of the compass. Some avalanches may break on older, weak faceted snow and may be triggered at a distance. Watch for cracking and collapsing as a sign of instability.
While these avalanches may not be enough to fully bury a rider, they are more than enough to rake someone through rocks and stumps.
Updates will follow as conditions warrant. This update is from 0700 on Wednesday November, 19, 2024.
Low
Moderate
Considerable
High
Extreme
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Special Announcements
The 17th Annual Utah Snow and Avalanche Workshop (USAW) is scheduled for Saturday December 7th - Information and tickets available here.
Snowbird has reopened uphill travel in Peruvian Gulch. Uphill travel is closed in Gad Valley.
Weather and Snow
Skies are clear. Temperatures in many areas bottomed out to the single digits but are again on the rise. Winds have been moderate to strong out of the west northwest over the past two days, blowing and drifting snow along the higher elevations.
We managed to squeeze another 4-8" of snow and up to 0.60" of snow water equivalent over the last couple of days with snow totals of up to 10-16" since the weekend. Snow depths sit at around 1-2.5', perhaps more in the wind zone. All of this new snow and wind transported snow is resting uncomfortably over weak faceted snow formed in late October and early November. This strong over weak structure is found on - very broadly - westerly to northerly to easterly aspects at the mid and upper elevations. You can see a layered snowpack below in Ryan Shea's photo in upper LCC.
For today, we'll have mostly sunny skies, temperatures rebounding into the 30s, and moderate winds from the southwest. A series of storms begin to impact the region late weekend into early next week, with strong southwest winds on Friday hinting at what may come.
Stay tuned.
Recent Avalanches
Two avalanches were triggered over the weekend. While they were not deep enough to bury a person, they would have been more than enough to cause injury had someone been caught in rocky terrain or washed over a cliff band.
The Tri-Chutes avalanche that was on a northwest aspect at 10,100' got my attention because of the collapses the party observed before they remotely triggered the avalanche (photo below). Another rider triggered an avalanche that failed on weak faceted snow on a north facing slope in Upper Silver Fork Canyon. (9800' north facing). Mark White also reported signs of natural activity from late last week in upper Mineral Fork.
Above photo showing the fracture line from Silver Fork (photo credit: Chris D).
Check out all recent observations and avalanches HERE.
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Avalanche Problem #1
Normal Caution
Type
Location
Likelihood
Size
Description
Continued incremental loading (wind, snow, and water) has started to sneak up on us and the places that are holding the most snow (upper elevation northerly facing aspects) are the places that are most suspect right now. Dig down on any slope you intend to travel on to see if there is a slab of new or wind loaded snow with soft weak snow underneath before committing to ascend or descend a slope over 30° degrees. I still think the biggest concern is the summer surface and I am still sticking to lower angle ridges and slopes where I can't get enough speed to hit a rock or stump just under the surface. Some avalanche problems you may want to keep on your radar:
  • New Snow - The new snow may not bond well to the different crusts and weak faceted snow in our shallow snowpack. There will be a potential for sluffing and even shallow soft slabs of storm snow, especially during any period of higher precipitation
  • Wind-Drifted Snow - Blowing winds will cause snow to drift at the upper elevations. Watch for signs such as cracking in fresh wind slabs. Although these drifts should be small, you will want to avoid getting caught in one in steep, consequential terrain
Additional Information
Before traveling within one of the ski resort boundaries, check out Resort Uphill Policies.
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