psuhoffman

Outside 48 hours better off just looking at the euro, Gfs and EPS GEFS then simply adjusting for bias and seasonal and pattern norms. Everything else just adds noise.

Yea I’m way past any interest in grasping at straws and praying some low probability threat magically trends better inside 72 hours. The payoff on that is too low. All you get is frustration 90% of the time.

I learned skiing the east and a lot of ice. And even when conditions are good in the east you will hit a wind blasted patch of ice and need to know how to use your edges. But I’ve reached a point where I no longer feel the need to prove myself and it’s just not that much fun. Plus I scaled back and only have a pair of atomic access light weight fat all terrain skis. They don’t catch an edge very well. Too light and too wide. So I agree with the statement above wrt skill but I want to have a good time not prove to random spectators how good I am.

I’m getting very concerned for the viability of spring skiing. March into early April is some of the best in northern New England. That’s my favorite time to hit up sugarbush, sugarloaf, Stowe and Wildcat. But their base is pathetic. Last weekend it was down to dirt and rock between the moguls at sugarbush and Killington. I got into a really dicey spot on vertigo head wall as half way down on the steepest spot there was no snow for a good 15 feet. Had to sideslide into the woods and make some tight turns to get out of that jam. If they don’t get at least several more feet they won’t last long at all once it warms. Worst part is out west is awful too. East had no snow until Jan then was cold but kinda dry. The west has been warm and dry! This spring season is at risk of being an epic fail.

Gfs overestimating the cold could also be overestimating the energy along the baroclinic boundary. A warmer boundary doesn’t necessarily mean west/wet.

I’m 10 times more upset that all guidance is showing a huge rainstorm followed by a hard freeze all the way to the arctic circle destroying the surface at every ski resort right better Presidents’ Day weekend. Even out west is a mess where they’ve had little snow in a month. I can’t even find a damn place to ski that will have powder anywhere in the lower 48 next weekend.

This is going well

That’s somewhat true. But Nina’s can produce a big storm. 1996, 2000, 2006 and 2011 all had a MECS or bigger storm. I think it’s a combo of 2 things. We spend a larger % of many Nina’s in cold patterns. Ninas are actually the coldest cohort other than modoki ninos. Yes the return on that cold is less. It’s a lot of tease with little payoff. And secondly it’s been a long time since 1996. We haven’t had a big Nina recently. 2014 was a big neutral. 2010 and 2015 were big ninos. It’s been 26 years since we had a blockbuster Nina year. And frankly all years other than those rare blockbusters are pretty bad here. That’s our climo. A few good years a decade and otherwise a lot of crap. Nina’s have all been in the lot of crap category.

If you sit at the poker table long enough you can start to predict the players next move.

100% but shockingly when I ran the numbers Nina’s are actually slightly snowier on the whole around here than every cohort except modoki ninos. Enso neutral and east based ninos are even worse! But Nina’s feel so frustrating and I think it’s because so often Nina’s do feature periods of sustained cold but it’s mostly a NW flow NS dominant frustrating cold pattern. When we do get cold in other enso years it has a much higher frequency of producing snow. Just my 2 cents why Nina’s feel so damn frustrating

I feel it’s 10 months away and I still haven’t decided what’s for dinner tonight.

Imma check out for a bit. Im starting to sound like Ji so…. Im not mad or even frustrated, I think it’s just I’ve accepted it is what it is and others are still trying to stay positive and good for them! If things turn around I’ll get on board.

That’s even worse. That had me getting 9” 2 runs ago. Lol.

Agree with all this. Unfortunately

2

You’re giving valid reasons why it “could” pleasantly surprise. It’s possible. I hope I’m wrong and it surprises. Won’t be the first time I’ve been dead wrong about something. But I’m just not in a rush to set myself up for disappointment. This has all the same flaws and issues as other recent setups. Why convince myself it’s going to end any better when the most likely outcome is the same? I’m still gonna track. Why not set the bar low then be pleasantly surprised instead of investing and being frustrated when everything trends to exactly what climo in a positive NAO progressive pattern says is most likely.

Convergence of the members will mean the max stripe will increase at this range but the axis continues to trend south.

Just a reminder that unless the 18z euro shows an actual hit the 18z suite was a net negative. I know how this game goes. Euro shows a slight improvement over its pathetic 12z solution and suddenly some get sucked in and we see “it’s trending better 3+ days left”. But trends in one individual model are irrelevant. It’s the trend across guidance that matters. If the most amplified guidance is trending less amplified and the least amplified trends more that’s not a trend it’s just convergence. We needed the Gfs and Ukmet from last night to hold and everything else to trend to them. Instead we saw everything converge on a middle ground today. And that’s always the most likely outcome. But the middle ground is a bad result for us unfortunately.

We might be seeing the 100 hour convergence. It’s just not converging to the solution we want so some will cling to “it’s still x hours away”. It’s not done and every so often something crazy can happen. Nothing is certain. But as we cross the magic 100 hour threshold again it’s in the unlikely category. Whenever we need the most extreme solution of all guidance to be right, I don’t care which model that is, it’s not likely. 90% of the time the reality is towards the middle of the spread of permutations not an extreme. We keep rooting for the most amplified or least amplified options and that’s not a winning strategy.

Stop it. A 6” storm is fine. I’m not hunting an hecs. Just over 1-3” fringe events.

Yes but it did trend towards the Gfs. It’s developing over us v northwest at least. But until it converges on the consensus it’s hard to take much away from it.

High end for this type setup is probably a 6-10” storm but that’s if everything goes totally perfect and maxes potential.

Where’s that man ruler meme

I don’t feel I have some right to said storms. I don’t feel slighted and go off when they don’t happen. And I won’t kick a 1-3” snow out of bed. But I’m not wasting time tracking that either. If it happens fine. But the target is higher to me lol.