NWS Weather Forecast for the La Sal Mountains

Gold Basin SNOTEL site (10,000')

Friday's dusting of snow has done little to improve or de-stabilize conditions and it's quite a mixed bag out there. Observations from yesterday are of widely variable snow surfaces though Travis Nauman and company managed to find a diamond in the rough with an isolated area of soft snow in the alpine. Ben Hathaway reported "poor, variable" conditions on Haystack Mountain, with "small pockets of powder, thin sun affected ice and rock hard wind board all around." A few shallow, isolated wind slabs were observed amongst the otherwise wind blasted and sun crusted surfaces but these are unlikely to pose much of a threat.

On sheltered shady aspects, snow at or near the surface is becoming loose and weak. This is something to keep an eye on when new snow finally comes. The buried persistent weak layer of faceted snow at the base of the snow pack has gone largely dormant, and it seems like we can put this problem to bed for awhile. This doesn't mean it no longer exists, or that you can't trigger an avalanche on it, but the odds at this point are extremely unlikely. As always, northerly aspects with thinner snowpack, and with very steep, rocky, radical terrain are the most suspect.

A bluebird day in the alpine beats a day almost anywhere else, even with variable conditions! Travis Nauman photo.