ORH_wxman

Yeah that was a big shift from prior ensembles runs...directly attirubted to the height rises in the AK/Yukon region....pushing a pretty stout PV south into Hudson. We'll have to see if other guidance goes that direction.

As an avid golfer and skiier myself, I would say both are pretty expensive sports. You can definitely cut corners and save money if you put in the effort to find deals and not get too picky on the equipment....but at the end of the day, you aren't going to be finding a lot of lower income people willing to pay even $25-30 for a lift ticket or greens fees. It is especially hard for these groups to find the cheaper fees on non-weekend/holidays when they aren't working.

Watch that dprog/dT on the heights in AK and adjacent Yukon.

Kevin's problem is he thinks mets talking about a more favorable pattern = "deep winter pattern".....he made that up himself. Sure, if you are looking for Stowe, VT weather with currier and ives eveyr other day plus 2 or 3 big storms with no pack loss in December, I would "agree" that we should be concerned that we will not get that. This isn't an epic setup, but it's far from the December 1999/2006/2011/2015 disaster type pig patterns. Best way to get deep winter with epic cold and no pack loss is to move to Caribou, ME. Down in southern New England, a decent December pattern still means you will risk some mild interludes or a cutter, but you have plenty of chances for snow events mixed in. You hope you roll 7s and not snake eyes.

There's been some awful takes in here. I don't see a reversion to the AK pig pattern at all. It doesn't mean we are going to definitely get snow, but we have a legit chance for events unlike when a pig pattern where the chances are remote. There's a lot of either deliberate trolling or just ignorance gong on here.....maybe we should break it down: Late November/first few days of Dec: AK pig pattern/torch....little chance for snow outside of upslope areas Dec 5 - Dec 15ish: +PNA/El Nino flavor pattern....legit chance for snow, especially from about 12/7 onward. Still a bit mild early on but getting colder as Canada starts to reload...esp by the 10th. Post-Dec 15th: Transition to more typical December La Nina? Could start rebuilding the Aleutian ridge. It looks pretty poleward though on early extended guidance. No sign of AK pig. More likely to see overrunning/SW flow events in this pattern vs coastals. But quick hitting coastals/redevelopers do still happen (see 12/25/17) This is obviously pretty far out, so it could change...maybe the El Nino look hangs on a bit longer than guidance shows (ala Dec 1975). We just don't know until we get closer.

You can forecast a grinch every year....just assume it will happen until you get close enough to rule it out.

Yep...you can see it at the H5 level a little bit too....look at the height trends N of the AK in the 11-15 loop....lot of rising heights up there.

Yeah next weekend def looks a bit different than even the 00z cycle and a lot different than yesterday’s 12z cycle. Still a tough ask for snow with the antecedent airmass but if things break perfectly you can’t rule it out. That change we’ve seen is step one in completing the Hail Mary.

No it doesn’t. Link?

The thing is, ensembles nailed this hideous end of November into early December pattern. Hasn’t been a surprise. I’m just glad that the pattern clearly shows a break and changes after first week of Dec. we’ve had many a winter where it sticks around and then you are screwed.

Sounds like dryslot is melting.

Yep. I’d watch next weekend if I was in a northern greens hamlet or some other typical upslope place that can do well on a CCB changeover with W or NW winds.... but down here we’ll need to hit triple 7s like twice in a row to get something significant out of it in terms of snow. Still some disagreement on exactly how the pattern shakes out after 12/5. GEFS and GGEM ensembles are still more amped out west, though they’ve converged some since last week.

I’d have to think 2010-2011 there definitely exceeded 80”. 1995-1996 did too...and prob approached (if not exceeded) 100” that year. ‘02-03 would have probably beaten ‘17-18 as well if we’re just discussing in the past 30 years or so.

Yeah I don’t think the attribution studies on the AO/NAO are particularly convincing in one direction or the other when you look at the whole body of literature. There’s certainly a lot more to learn. They are hard enough to figure out on a seasonal scale too.

There were research papers just a few years ago that argued melting sea ice was contributing to the severe -NAO/-AO patterns from 2008-2013....but I guess those went out of fashion the last few years. I haven’t seen anything recently about the stronger AO+ patterns though back in the early 2000s, there were papers that argued global warming was contributing to the strong +AO patterns that had become more prevalent in the 1980s/1990s vs the previous couple decades.

The upslope potential behind the 2nd system looks pretty decent. You’ll prob get a little behind the first system but the second one might be more favorable for several inches. Still a ways out but it takes a better looking track up into southern Quebec for it.

You’ll prob get decent upslope behind the 2nd storm anyway. Gonna need to get lucky for the synoptic stuff to be snow or mostly snow. It’s a hideous setup. Pattern gets a lot better once it passes.

EPS looks like they trended a little more amplified out west in the LR. Maybe a nod toward the GEFS.

There’s also still wet snow to the west and southwest side of that low. It’s severely negatively tilted so I’m not seeing how it should snow over us on that setup/track. If we had a fresh arctic airmass Ahead of it then it would be different but this never had that look. Maybe after the ULL moves over we get instability snow showers or graupel type stuff.

Hard to hate the pattern on GEFS after first week of Dec. GEFS are starting to hit the NAO region a bit more now too

Lol. I’m not sure how many times we posted that the first week of December was probably going to be crap with a garbage airmass. It was at least like 8-10 times between several of us in here.

That thing is a hail mary at best. Absolutely putrid airmass out ahead of it. Maybe a little better than a hail mary for NNE, but not by a lot. Really, the better pattern is beyond the first week of December.

For selfish reasons, I'm always happy that most people do not follow the Ginxy/ORH_wxman school of thought when it comes to skiing.....ski hard in March. Usually the best conditions of the season are in March at most places. The bonus is that you also are less likely to be in 0F temps with the sun struggling to stay above the horizon at 3pm like you get in late December and January.

Yeah openiong day was fine I'm sure because of the timing of the upslope...I'm talking about in general though early on...lots of thaw and refreeze the next 10 days = icy death ribbons

Gotta get those runs in on the icy death ribbons. This is why I rarely ski in early season. Even when there is a big snowstorm in early season, the pent up demand usually makes it hard to avoid big crowds unless I play hooky and go during a weekday. But I'm guessing things will be rocking pretty good by Xmas week up in the ski areas if the ensembles are correct. Looks like a pretty good 2-3 week period coming up post-12/5.