The weather in the valleys have been fair with very little snow but the higher elevations have seen some snow/rain storms and it definitely has made conditions in the backcountry a bit dangerous.  Castle Country Radio was able to speak over the telephone with the Utah Avalanche Center’s Brett Kobernik about the latest conditions.

“We’ve had a couple of spits and spurts throughout the week, it really hasn’t added a whole lot of snow and hasn’t really increase the avalanche danger a whole lot. The danger has slowly decreasing, but that doesn’t mean it’s stable and safe out there. We’re going to be dealing with our weak snow, near the base of the snowpack for some time to come,” said Kobernik. The dangers are present as three avalanches were triggered by snowmobilers – thankfully, no one was hurt.

As for the upcoming week, it looks to be seasonal highs in the valleys which pose further avalanche concerns in the backcountry. “Often times when we get a rapid warmup, things can become quite unstable with the snow. Usually what I would be concerned about is that the lower elevations terrain is going to get wet and saturated and perhaps we see some natural avalanche activity. But the lower elevations have already gotten a little bit wet, and there’s not a ton of snow at the lower elevations either. So I don’t think we are going to see a whole lot of avalanche activity due to that warm weather,” stated Kobernik. Generally, when we see warmer temperatures it actually can help stabilize the layering in the upper elevations. It will help to stabilize conditions, but it will not eliminate the avalanche problem.

We are about halfway through the winter and we really need some good snowstorms to pass through our area. “The best-case scenario is we slide into a more of a stormy weather pattern and the more snow we can stack up in the high country, the more it will smash those weak layers near the base, and stabilize things and we should be able to travel around safely without having to worry about it, it’s definitely not the case right now,” said Kobernik. Folks can stay up to date on the avalanche conditions every morning at 7:00 am as the forecast for Manti Skyline is updated every day. Those conditions can be found by visiting the Utah Avalanche Center website at https://utahavalanchecenter.org/