Wasatch Cache and Uinta National Forests

In partnership with: Forest Service Utah Avalanche Center, The Friends of the Utah Avalanche Center and Utah State Parks.

Special Avalanche ADVISORY

Good morning. This is Craig Gordon with the Forest Service Utah Avalanche Center with your avalanche and mountain weather advisory for the western Uinta Mountains. Today is Friday, February 27, 2004 and it’s 6:00 a.m.

Current conditions:

We’ll see a lull in the action until later this morning when another strong weather impulse is forecast to move into the region. Currently 10,000’ temperatures are close to 20 degrees and winds are southerly with hourly averages in the teens and gusts in the low 20’s along the ridges. We’ve received close to 2’ of dense, heavy snow in the past 24 hours.

Avalanche Conditions:

On a sad note, an avalanche fatality occurred late yesterday in Daly Canyon near the town of Park City. Details as to the particulars of the avalanche are still being sifted through and we’ll post them when they become available.

It’s been a wild ride the past 24 hours and the recent combination of heavy, dense snow and strong winds has prompted me to issue a SPECIAL AVALANCHE ADVISORY. Yesterday’s hurricane force winds were blasting, moving plenty of snow around and creating tender wind drifts even at the lower elevations. Several observers reported these slabs were quite sensitive to their additional weight with avalanches breaking in unusual locations and well above them as they moved out onto the slope. We’ve added a tremendous amount of weight to our snowpack in a short period of time and the weak facets will need some time to adjust. An avalanche triggered today certainly has the possibility of breaking into deeper weak layers in the snowpack and this would produce a very large, dangerous, and possibly unsurvivable avalanche.

People without well-developed avalanche, route finding, and rescue skills should avoid avalanche terrain today.

Remember even if you’re playing in low angle terrain be aware of steep slopes above and adjacent to you.

Bottom Line:

The avalanche danger is CONSIDERABLE this morning, rising to HIGH this afternoon, at mid and upper elevations, on all steep slopes with recent deposits of wind-drifted snow. A Considerable avalanche danger means that human triggered avalanches are probable and natural avalanches are possible. A High avalanche danger means both human triggered and natural avalanches are likely.

Out of the wind and on low angle slopes the avalanche danger is generally LOW

Mountain Weather:

A heavy snow warning continues through tonight. Snow will be developing by late morning and it looks like we’ll see 4”-8” today with another 6”-10” forecast for tonight. Snow should linger into Saturday and become showery towards the end of the weekend. Temperatures will be cooling today with highs at 10,000’ in the low teens and at 8,000’ near 22 degrees. Overnight lows will be around 15 degrees. Winds will be out of the south this morning, switching to the southwest by afternoon and should be in the 15-25 mph range along the ridges.

General Information:

We can always use snow and avalanche information and your snowpack and avalanche observations could help to save someone’s life. If you see or trigger an avalanche give us a call at 801-231-2170 or 1-800-662-4140.

Also, if you’d like to schedule a free avalanche awareness talk and/or field day give us a call at 801-524-5304.

The information in this advisory is from the U.S. Forest Service, which is solely responsible for its content. This advisory describes general avalanche conditions and local variations always occur.

I will update this advisory by 7:30 a.m. on Saturday, Feb.28, 2004.

Thanks for calling.