powderfreak

Good snow growth, a quick dusting.

Great views on the hill today. Solid undercast.

Hide the wives and children. Daddy’s smashing windows today.

It likes to amp up at times, a definitely flaw at this point.

Above the clouds this morning (not my photo though).

It's bottom bucket stuff for snow depth. That Grinch cutter just decimated any chance of a snowpack and it hasn't come close to average snowfall (which can be 2-3" per day up high).

Mount Mansfield snow depth at the COOP stake went from 10" to 16" in the daily records. That fits with most snowfall observations, with a hearty half a foot of snow. Probably won't settle much. Still a very low tide snowpack on the whole.

Noticed that. I also think the consistency is pretty much identical at the mountain. The drive from the ski area to town didn't seem to change at all right after the snowfall. I think it was pretty uniform.. 5-7" swath. Similar water equiv over a large area? The models had a large area of uniform QPF, more so than usual IMO.

Melted 0.61" here in the valley on 5.5" snow. Pretty consistent with models showing 0.5-0.75" QPF.

Yeah my bad, I just think the EURO has these exotic westward QPF progs and amped solutions at times. Hard to tell when it's right vs. wrong. The mid-level banding is definitely fair game to extend further away from a deepening SFC low track.

I definitely think mid-level banding could always be NW... ripping good DGZ flakes to the NW of models for sure. I’m just never sold on the CCB being west of modeled location with the Euro if that makes sense. Mid-level banding, absolutely possible. That’s usually poorly modeled.

I'm seeing what I have saved, but yeah the EURO likes to over-amp. This worked out well at like 72 hours lead time in December. It was grossly over-amped until about 36-48 hours in the earlier December event. I'm still looking for my saved model runs but I could've sworn that other December event looked better here on the EURO than reality. I've shoveled plenty of EURO snow on the NW side, just saying. Not trying to piss you off, lol.

I guess I’d have to look at the time frame. Maybe it’s more mid-range lead time. But I’ve gotten a lot of Euro snow in some of these events this year. It definitely isn’t the model that tends to be SE of actual, but the lead time probably matters. Im not saying it’s right or wrong, but the Euro gradually took that event away from here. Maybe it’s location specific.

You guys really haven’t been paying attention to the Euro have you? I’m not saying it’s right or wrong, but these posts make me think no one had seen it’s bias before of being NW of other guidance.

It’s not all bad news, ski country up here could use another quarter inch of QPF in a 2-4” refresher. Been an ugly holiday period before today. The snowmobile trails could use it.

I’d trust the EPS, but man the Euro OP has been way more amped in multiple coastal low events this season. It loves to tuck them in. I’m still shoveling ECMWF snow like the GGEM when it comes to coastal systems, phantom snow on the NW side while it tucks it in. Hopefully it pulls a rabbit from its hat this time.

A friend grooming out the fat bike/XC/Rec trail this evening... finally looks like something closer to winter around Stowe.

Totally nitpicking here, but given the general uniform snow totals with this event from mountain peaks to lower elevations, two spots stand out. The ski areas giving a large range don’t really make sense to me when the others are showing tight 0-1” ranges from top to bottom. MRG said 4-8”, which sounds more like a forecast than a snow total and Smuggs said 6-9”. I’m definitely OCD () but those feel like “mailing it in” reports. How much snow is out there? “Ehh it’s somewhere between 4 and 8 inches.” Or the old “we have 6 at the bottom so add a couple/few for the top.”

Yeah just what was needed. Had 5.5” at home with no board clearing but I bet there’s a good shot of water in that. The snowbanks definitely look like they have the heft. Got really windy this afternoon up at the mountain but 1500ft was showing mostly in the 6-7” range. Upper mountain was very similar, not much change at all with elevation, which is normal in synoptic events. Looks like MVL snuck up to 33F for a high but then dropped pretty fast this evening into mid-20s now. Overall I think this event was pretty well modeled and fit my thinking of a dense 4-7” locally with ratios under 10:1. Pretty classic SWFE style.

Looks like 5.5” of dense stuff at home with no board clearing. I’m melting it now so we’ll see what the water is. Town looks great with snowbanks back. 1500ft and 3000ft were both 6-7” range. Just called it 6” for the resort total. Like to be conservative on the whole.

3,000ft. Feels like there’s at least 0.66-0.75” water in it.

You expect a lot from models on the edge of p-types lol. GFS had zero snow there.

3000ft High Road Plot.

Had just a touch over 3” at 6:45am. J.Spin’s 8:1 ratio makes sense, stuff was real dense. Should easily hit the 0.50-0.75” QPF forecasts.

It is just crushing snow. Rate isn’t that high (1”/hr) but it has to be at least a tenth of liquid per hour.