powderfreak

Today is a mind f*ck…. walking the dog now by headlamp because it’s dark at 5pm, in shorts and T-shirt like it’s summer, with a tropical southerly breeze… it’s quite the vibe. This must be what Christmas in Florida feels like.

Almost turned on the A/C in November, lol.

70F this morning off a low of 65F. Normal high is 48F, low 29F.

It’s like hurry up and wait, haha. Stressful to get everything prepped and ready to go… only to then sit and watch the weather for 2-3 weeks.

Very thankful my salary isn’t based on eastern winter weather lol. The good news is that November overall is such a small minor number of a ski season’s financial outlook that it doesn’t move the needle. The Holiday Week and Presidents Week can be like 50% of an entire season’s business. Those are the big ones and Grinch loves to crash it.

70F here.

That’s not psycho babble bargaining in my thought process. Statistically, the long term pattern looks highly unfavorable. Everything is currently stacked against a solid cold precip event in New England. But if I’m a forecaster, I’m leaving open the chance of sneaking in an impactful winter weather event in this NNE climate despite the highly unfavorable background weeks 3-6. Its an afterthought, but sometimes one sneaks in during the low solar time of year. The most likely scenario is the mean outlook though.

There were some sleet pellets at the onset here with temps in the upper 30s. It was cold at summit level, then warm above that.

Radar looks like more bark than bite. Returns look healthy for like 0.02”/hr rates lol.

Hopefully it’ll offset the pain of this…

“Surface maximum temperature.” I think it’s the max reached in the previous 6 hours.

LFG on that.

The irony is the one saying no frosts until Xmas is the same one who 5-10 years ago used to see 0.10-0.25" QPF as snow and call for 4-8" to start, maybe more. The late frost/freeze stuff is largely because that poster might literally be the last place in New England to see a frost or freeze.

The ensemble means don’t look ideal, it is what it is. That doesn’t mean it won’t snow or get cold. The same goes for great looking patterns, that doesn’t mean it will snow. Hopefully that’s a baseline understanding for most on here.

Theres like two themes going on… Wolfie seems to be reading these like it’s never going to snow at all this winter. “Pattern looks unfavorable.” ”It will snow at some point between now and April.”

Hit 22F at 1am and is up to 34F now with cloud over.

You stay mixed or mix out with the best of them, I'm low key fascinated by how hard it is for your spot to decouple at all. Just free air up there that never goes truly calm. Warm front will lift through and 850mb winds go SW tonight... perfect set-up for a strong inversion and cold air pooling in the valleys, on its way out of the region as the air mass gets pushed NE. On it's way out aloft, but leaving behind some residual cold pockets at the surface. Here's 850mb as everyone down low falls to freezing or below.

It's only a chilly night these days if the peppers suffer on a hilltop in CT. 28F here, and forecast calls for 20F tonight, but increasing high/mid level clouds could stifle it up here. I keep thinking these nights are chilly, but I saw an 8F back in 2020 with 7-10" of snow on the ground even down here in the valley on 11/2-3/2020. I do not remember that early shot of winter, ha.

The ensembles aren’t great for sure… even getting random Op runs like the 6z GFS where the 540 thickness doesn’t go underneath us again for the entirety of the run after today. Could be a slow ramp up this year. But we’ll get a bunch more nice days on the bike/hike trails.

Congrats on the sub-freezing temperature.

The good news is that lack of solar strength, mixing, etc won’t maximize the SFC temperatures like can be done at other times of year with this H5 pattern. Low level cold undercutting the mid-level warmth and CAD from the Maritimes can lead to cooler surface temps than the long wave pattern suggests. Overall though, the EPS/Euro Ensemble has been showing 50-members of upper level ridging in the means. Pretty stable/steady pattern. Persistence. Monday… 10+ days from now… 15 days from now…

36F in the village and still breezy out of the NW. No inversion developing yet, still mixing. 19F at the top of the Quad… a fully mixed atmosphere is usually a 15 degree difference/decrease between home and the free air up at the top lift terminals. Checks out tonight as a 17 degree difference, very well mixed. The gradient seems steeper than normal in the mid-slope. From 2,600ft to 3,600ft it goes from 27F to 19F. Secondary push of CAA from 925-850mb?

That first day seeing the guns firing is a good day though for sure. Put a little hop in your step. Long range wise, I’d be a bit nervous about the World Cup at Killington.

Killington is surprising, agreed there. Yeah for the other areas like Stowe, Sugarbush, Jay, etc… making snow this weekend would be to test things, train staff. But if we can’t hit the opening date for whatever reason it won’t be because 30-36 hours was passed by on Upper Lord on 11/2. When Stowe can’t open it’s because of below Crossover to the lift maze. If it’s 11/8, the guns are on right now even just at the top.

We held off too. Wet-bulb temps aren’t that great except for like the top quarter of the hill.