LaGrangewx

Weeniest of weenie maps 

For what it’s worth the Latest Para GFS is extremely different from the operational. 

Haven’t been active in awhile but have started getting back on. Seems like a great time. 18z GFS is an absolute walloping!! 12z EPS was also great! Much better than the operational 

2 hours ago, J.Spin said:

I totally agree, and with the numbers that keep staring me in the face, that’s got to be the case.  Combine 150”+ of reasonably dense synoptic snowfall with the excellent retention of a place like Sunday River, and things will generally work out fine.  You’re even going to have some nice powder skiing on the days with fresh snow, you’re just not going to get, on average, the supply of powder that you’re going to get in places like the Northern Greens with an additional 150”+ of champagne on top of that.

I think Sugarloaf falls right in line with that theory as well.  In that 1995 Powder Magazine article, their annual snowfall average was reported as 164”, although I’ve now also seen numbers out there like 189”, and it looks like they’ve got a “very round” 200” on their website.  They’ve probably got bit more elevation, perhaps a bit of help from their great latitude, and then they might get in on a bit of upslope, to boost them over Sunday River.  With the incredible snow retention at Sugarloaf, things work out quite well with the annual snowfall they get.

Sugarloaf and Wildcat both have a solid amount of substantially higher terrain up to 4k+ instead of 3k and probably benefit a bit more from orographic enhancement which gets them to that 200 range like you said. 

2 hours ago, backedgeapproaching said:

I think without question the snowiest spot in SVT is the area north of Woodford towards Glastenbury like you mentioned. That area is always lit up on radar on any type of NW uplsope flow--much more than any SVT ski area or any area in general.  It's like a Woodford on steroids as it upslopes in almost any direction and there are spots 3k to almost 4k in elevation there.

Problem is there is literally nothing there--no roads, houses, nothing..lol. So who knows how much really falls.

 

Yup you highlighted it perfectly. Just check that area out on any high-res model and its always the bulls-eye in southern Vermont for almost all systems. I think the Woodford Snobusters Snowmobile Club goes back in there but I could be wrong. I bet they see some ridiculous depths for southern Vermont if thats the case. 

37 minutes ago, J.Spin said:

I’m right there with you; I’m shocked every time I look at the reported snowfall averages up and down the spine, especially with so many people having the perception that the Southern Vermont Ski Areas get the most snowfall in the state.  Does the annual snowfall really fall off nearly 100” over the southern half of the state?  I guess it’s not inconceivable, since it appears to fall off roughly that much over the northern half of the state, but it would seem like there would need to be a “floor” for annual snowfall numbers at some point.

I almost feel like I’ve previously seen (I’m not sure how many years ago) Killington/Pico with snowfall averages around 225”, which kind of fits nicely in the annual snowfall gradient from north to south.  But, that’s clearly my memory trying to smooth things out, because I just checked back in the SkiVT-L archives from 1997, and even then, Killington is listed as having an annual snowfall of 250”, and that was referencing the big Powder Magazine ski area snowfall article from 1995:

https://list.uvm.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind9703&L=SKIVT-L&P=359221

A few things to note on the 250” number though:

1) Remember that Killington does have roughly 700’ of vertical over Mount Snow in terms of summit elevation, so if both resorts are reporting summit area snowfall numbers, that’s a pretty substantial disparity.  That’s more vertical than some of the SNE ski areas that people were recently talking about in one of the threads.

2) You know when you’re seeing super-round numbers for averages , such as “250 inches”, they are very likely heavily rounding whatever the average is.  So they could easily have average snowfall of something like 235” and be rounding to the nearest 50”.

3) Continuity – see below

The fact that the Killington annual snowfall average was listed as 250” 25 years ago is worthy of consideration here.  I’m pretty sure they have been owned by various companies during that time, and there has to have been substantial turnover in management, snow reporters, and other positions.  Is there really some systematic conspiracy in place to have everyone consistently over-report snowfall numbers so that they can get to approximately 250” every season?  It’s really hard to imagine that over all that time, there’s not one person who’s going to stand up and refuse to fudge numbers?  Or somehow, despite what must have been plenty of managerial and mountain ops turnover, some sort of sacred edict to inflate snowfall numbers to 250” has been handed from manager to manager, observer to observer, etc.?

And here’s a related argument that seems even harder to punch holes in.  Mount Snow reports that mid-150” snowfall average, and I’m pretty sure they’ve been reporting that number for a similar time to Killington’s 250” number.  The same argument goes for how in the world are they going to get by low-balling their snowfall numbers for all those years?  As an example to reinforce that, one that always blows my mind as well, is the annual snowfall average for Sunday River.  They report an annual snowfall average similar to Mount Snow (I’m seeing current numbers out there ranging from 155” to 167”).  Think about that, Sunday River has plenty of latitude – they’re at essentially the same latitude as Stowe.  How in the world does a place like that get such little snowfall?  Are they low-balling their snowfall numbers as well?  What resort in their right mind though is going to constantly low ball their snowfall numbers?  Even if “snowmaking” is your thing, and you’re not really concerned about natural snowfall, what’s the point in doing that?

The conclusion I keep coming to, year after year as I think about this, is that those 150”-ish numbers are the real annual snowfall numbers for places like that.  Think about it, Sunday River has plenty of latitude, and they’re positioned ridiculously well for getting hit by typical “coastal” storms.  How do they only get 150-ish inches of snow a season?  I think part of it is what I was saying in that big “coastal” storms (or even with the Atlantic as a primary moisture source as you nicely put it) just don’t contribute a ton of extra snowfall on a seasonal basis.  I think it really comes down to that theory that PF has – there’s sort of this “floor” of synoptic snow around the Northeastern U.S., that doesn’t change a ton with respect to an area’s geographic position.  There are of course the usual elevation effects on that, but that’s pretty much canceled out comparing mountain sites that are all in the 3,000’ to 4,000’ range.  I think if mountains don’t get in on some sort of “extra” moisture/snow, such as upslope, lake-effect, or whatever, then those low numbers are what you’re going to see.  The increases above that base annual snowfall are what really set them apart, and that increases dramatically as you head north up the spine of the Greens.

Really thorough analysis. 150" at Sunday River probably goes a long way with their retention, especially if it is from a majority of synoptic snow. I think somewhere like Mt. Snow obviously does not market their snowfall the same way Jay Peak or even Stowe does. Mt. Snow doesn't rely on snow to draw crowds, as their insane Terrain park, location, and amount of consistently groomed cruisers does the job. I think somewhere like Jay has to make it known loud and clear that they get that kind of snow, to draw people up to their more remote location. Its for that reason that a place like Mt Snow in my opinion does not track snowfall quite as diligently and make sure they report as many inches as truthfully possible from the snowiest place on the hill. They also don't get anywhere near the nickel and dime type snow that the Northern Vermont resorts get. As someone said earlier it is literally 10% of it and almost all their snow is synoptic whereas Killington can definitely get some more orographic benefit snows. I also believe Mt. Snow and Stratton are east of the best orographic snows in Southern Vermont that actually occur over the center of the plateau near Woodford and up to Glastenbury Mountain. Its amazing to see the difference in snow depths at times in the Mt. Snow base area vs Route 9 crest in Woodford when I've driven through there. I think you're on to something saying that 150" could be a number for eastern ski areas at 3000' in good locations for coastal storms that don't benefit from orographic snows. 

2 minutes ago, MRVexpat said:

215" seems much more reasonable for a long term average

It's interesting. Their data goes back to the 80s and the best 10 year average during that period seems to be around 260. 10 years is probably not enough data for a true long term average. I know another post above mentioned how it would be surprising if the r/s line in an event was between (Stratton+Mt Snow) and Killington but it does happen. I remember the mid-march storm of 2014 dropped 2 feet on Killington but it was a mixed mess in southern Vermont. Probably does not happen too frequently but it can. Killington is more centrally located on the crest of the spine than Stratton and Mt. Snow which probably helps them a bit as well. Long term I'd guess they probably average somewhere in that 200-250 range but they seem to have had a really tough go of it the past 10+ years. They haven't had a winter above their claimed 250 since 2010 and consecutive above average winters since the mid 2000s. Southern Vermont had a big 2018 thanks to March and even Whiteface had had a huge winter recently with the monster 2017 storm where they got like 50". Killington can't seem to catch a break someone alluded to it earlier but recently they've been sandwiched between patterns it seems.   

One thing to consider is where the resorts are measuring snowfall. I know for a fact Killington used to mention on there website that they were listing summit snowfall totals as their average, which definitely can be misrepresentative of the resort as a whole especially as big as Killington is.

I just looked at their website and their 10 year average is around 215" at the summit and that is excluding the abysmal 2015-2016 season. 

6 minutes ago, mreaves said:

@powderfreak posts some great undercast pictures from the top of Mt. Mansfield from time to time.  I saw one from Whiteface yesterday.  I don't remember where it was.

Yup I saw that picture too. I saw it on nws btv Twitter

10 minutes ago, jculligan said:

Yes...in fact I personally witnessed this at Cannon Mountain last December. It was snowing enough to accumulate at the base of the mountain...then we ascended through the cloud layer and eventually broke above the clouds with the most amazing undercast I've ever witnessed at the summit.

Wow that’s cool. I wonder if that’s rare or a more frequent occurrence and the summit misses out on some snow

Was looking at Bretton Woods on Instagram and saw they reported snow but MW Observatory has not reported any and seemed to be above the clouds yesterday. Can the summit of Mount Washington actually be above the upslope at times? 

5 minutes ago, jculligan said:

Many may already be aware of this, but there are three snow plots in the northern Presidentials....two on Mount Washington (Hermit Lake and Harvard Cabin) and one on Mount Adams (Gray Knob). All three are very close to 4000' in elevation:

https://mountwashingtonavalanchecenter.org/snow-plot-data/

I've noticed some rather significant differences in snow depth between the Hermit Lake and Harvard Cabin sites, which is interesting because they are not that far apart from one another. Snow depths tend to be deeper at Hermit Lake. I've been to Hermit Lake plenty of times, but I've never made the trek over to the Harvard Cabin - I'm assuming the lower snow depths are either the result of wind scouring or perhaps a more dense forest canopy (Hermit Lake is rather open). I'll have to check it out this winter.

I passed Harvard Cabin on the way up Huntington and then came down Tuckerman through Hermit Lake. I remember it being very dense on the way to Harvard Cabin but if I remember correctly it opens up a bit from there to the base of Huntington Ravine. Looking at the Topo Harvard Cabin is at about 3500 and Hermit 3900. They are less than 3/4 of a mile apart as the crow flies so yes it would be very interesting if there were truly drastic differences.

4 hours ago, jculligan said:

Hermit Lake started archiving daily snowfall amounts back in early 2018, but due to the Covid shut-down last year they've only had one full winter of publicly-available observations so far. They measured 190" in the winter of 2018-2019 (compared to 261" on the summit) and they were up to 175" on 4/13 last year before reporting stopped (compared to 253" on the summit). It's unfortunate that reporting stopped in mid April this year, because unusually heavy snowfall continued in the alpine for about another month after that. But regardless, based on the last two winters it seems that Hermit Lake averages about 70-75% of the summit's seasonal snowfall...which would correlate to an average of approximately 215" or 220". Again, this is based on a very limited data set...but it's all we really have to work with at the moment.

I've been skiing the east side of Mount Washington on a very regular basis since 2013 and it's not at all uncommon for the peak seasonal depth to eclipse 90" in that location. It's a very impressive spot. I can't speak to the other locations you've noted, though I would imagine Hermit Lake has a higher average due to its elevation (nearly 3900' compared to 2800' at Lake Colden and 2900' at Chimney Pond). Maybe others in this thread can speak more to that!

Thanks for the input. That’s Interesting. I would love to get over and ski Tuckermans this spring. Seems like the 2 years you mentioned are probably below average seasons snowfall wise. I remember reading in this thread that some are very skeptical of MW summit snowfall measurement practices and that it’s almost impossible to accurately measure up there. I remember guesses that In reality it could average more like 400” which seems believable at 6280. I know Wildcat claims about 200” at 3000 feet mid mountain across the notch and Hermit lake is part of the actual MW basin about 1000’ higher than wildcat so I guessed maybe it would be more like 250”. But time will see if they are reporting now. I feel like it could be slightly more accurate down there than the summit as it is far more sheltered from the wind. 

Always love reading through this thread. I haven’t been the most active on here but I keep up with reading for the inside scoop. I have lots of weather and snow related questions and figure you guys have great input. Was wondering what you guys thought hermit lake plot averages? 250? Or even more?
Also how do you think that compares to Chimney pond ranger station under Katahdin and the Lake Colden Ranger station in the Adk at 2800’ sandwiched in between Algonquin and Colden. I’ve always viewed those as the 3 big interior backcountry locations with at least some snow or depth reports. I know both chimney and hermit lake had about 100” depth in 2017 and Colden outpost routinely has 5-6 feet. I’ve hiked all over the ADK and just did Huntington Ravine and Katahdin this past September. Both were tremendously impressive. 
 

Does this storm have any similarities to late December 2016? I see similarities in the snowfall maps being posted but I was wondering if the actual storm dynamics were at all similar from someone with more meteorological knowledge. I remember That 2016 storm trended East at the last second and instead of crushing the white mountains it was immediate inland Maine

Haven’t posted in awhile but love reading this forum. I was wondering what the Vermont resorts are expecting in terms of crowds and business, considering only Vermont residents seem to be able to ski this year as of now. I would guess a vast majority of skiers for the southern Vermont resorts come from out of state. Are they expecting to take a massive hit this season?