J.Spin

Event totals: 0.9” Snow/0.46” L.E. It was still snowing this morning, so there will be a bit more accumulation to report, but this event has brought about an inch of snow and a half inch of liquid to our site thus far. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.6 inches New Liquid: 0.03 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 20.0 Snow Density: 5.0% H2O Temperature: 33.8 F Sky: Light Snow (1-5 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: Trace

I was just looking out toward the spine and the peaks are hidden because the cloud ceiling seems to be in the 1,500’ – 2,000’ range, but the precipitation was looking like snow, so I checked some of the mountain cams. I see there’s an inch or two of accumulation at the Sugarbush 3,900’ webcam with snow falling, and it’s even snowing down to ~2,000’ on the webcam at Bolton’s main base. So it looks like this next storm is underway.

I’m not sure I’d say this late season is all that unique specifically – it’s April being exactly like April, and I think April snowfall and number of storms thus far are probably average at best? We’re still a few inches behind average snowfall for April at our site, so it’s probably something similar for the mountains, but PF might have his April stats to know for sure. Maybe the season as a whole is a little more unique because of the way the snowpack caught back up to average at this time of year, but I’m sure similar things have happened before with the way these spring storms can drop so much liquid equivalent.

Nice – I saw that Mother Nature had caught back up to average at the stake, and I was going to post the plot if you hadn’t. That definitely bodes well for the rest of the season relative to where the snowpack was a few weeks ago. And there’s no concern about the snow from this most recent storm falling short on its contribution to the snowpack – with the density I encountered out there, it’s probably close to the density of settled season snowpack already. This storm was a really solid addition of liquid to the pack, even if it didn’t produce quite the right-side-up quality of deposition that some storms do.

I wasn’t able to get out for a ski tour on Tuesday morning, but I did have enough time to head out to Bolton later in the afternoon and check out what this most recent storm had to offer. As we know, a great feature of the March through June portion of the ski season is the long lasting daylight, and that makes late afternoon and even evening ski sessions very practical. It kept snowing right through the day on Tuesday, but it did warm up enough to melt back the earlier snow a bit, especially the lower one went in elevation. There was still a solid coating of snow in place even in the late afternoon at the base of the Bolton Valley Access Road, and here’s the storm accumulations profile I found at that point: 340’: T-1” 1,000’: 1-2” 1,500’: 3-4” 2,000’: 7-8” 2,500’: 8-10” 3,000’: 10-12” This storm was unquestionably another solid resurfacing of the snowpack at elevation. The mountains must have had at least an inch and a half of liquid equivalent as snow, and combined with the density of that snow, it was enough to resurface slopes of just about any angle, right up to the steepest of the steep. The density of the snow meant that it covered, and stayed stuck to, just about every slope out there. It’s easy for snow to be too dense to enable quality turns though, and this storm didn’t just flirt with that line, it flew way past it. Even the folks out in the west coast ranges that routinely deal with Sierra Cement and Cascade Concrete would have cried after dealing with this stuff. There are times when you’re ski touring, and you can’t quite tell what the quality of the turns is going to be like until you really rip off the skins and start your descent; this was not one of those times. Right from the start of my tour, I could tell that the skiing was going to be disastrous. On the lower half of the mountain from say 2,000’ on up to ~2,500’, the snow was super dense, with a bit of melting going on to up the density just a bit more for good measure. I held out a little hope that the quality of the snow in the higher elevations would improve, as it often does with lower temperatures producing drier snow that skis better. Ha, not this time. As I continued to ascend, the snow conditions only got worse. The snow went from something that was super dense and a bit wet, that you really didn’t sink into much… to an even worse version of that. As temperatures dipped below freezing on the upper mountain, the top couple of inches of snow has become a solid mass to produce the most horrible, upside-down snowpack you could imagine. The skiing was challenging, dangerous, disgusting, and everything in between. So the snowfall from this storm was indeed a great resurfacing, and a solid addition to the mountain snowpack, but it would have taken another good half foot or so of drier snow to really get the immediate quality of the ski surfaces up to snuff. It was snowing while I was out there on Tuesday, with some nice steady snow at times, but there was probably only another inch or two of additional snow above the dense stuff, so not enough to really bring up the snow quality to something more respectable. Every spring snowstorm is different though, and that’s part of the fun of experiencing them, and we’ll just have to see what the next one does. A few shots from Tuesday:

Event totals: 1.1” Snow/1.38” L.E. We had a few flakes flying at the house this morning that will call for another trace in tomorrow morning’s CoCoRaHS report, but the totals above should be it for this event at our site. I’m seeing plenty of storm totals around here in the 1.5” range for liquid equivalent, so you know the mountains picked up at least that much. That’s certainly a solid resurfacing for the slopes, and I’ll pass along some mountain observations as soon as I get a chance to write those up. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.2 inches New Liquid: 0.12 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 1.7 Snow Density: 60.0% H2O Temperature: 36.0 F Sky: Cloudy Snow at the stake: Trace

Event totals: 0.9” Snow/1.09” L.E. This morning’s snow at our site was impressively dense – there was more than half an inch of liquid in just an inch of snow. Lifting the snowboards to clear them this morning was a monumental effort. We’d already had more than an inch of liquid equivalent from this storm as of this morning’s early report, and I haven’t been up to the slopes yet, but it must have been an almost instant resurfacing with the amount of liquid equivalent that has come through the area thus far. Power is out in a lot of places due to the dense snow, and Bolton’s main base webcam is down for presumably that reason. It looks like there’s about a half foot of new snow on the Stowe snow stake webcam though. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.9 inches New Liquid: 0.58 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 1.6 Snow Density: 64.4% H2O Temperature: 32.7 F Sky: Snow (2 – 10 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 1.0 inches

After Saturday’s fresh powder out on the hill, I hadn’t really planned to ski on Sunday, since the forecast called for gray skies and temperatures heading above the freezing mark. We were thiking we might have left one of our water bottles up around 2,800’ on Wilderness during our tour on Saturday though, so that was incentive enough to get me out for another go. If in doubt, it’s generally good to get out and get some exercise anyway. I made my way up to Bolton around midday, and whereas temperatures on Saturday were in the upper 20s F when we’d arrived, on Sunday they were in the upper 30s F. Some of the new Friday/Saturday snow had definitely melted back, and that effect decreased with elevation, but the freezing line was still somewhere above the 3,000’ mark. So, I never encountered any snow yesterday that had been fully preserved below freezing. With that said, the snow skied really well. On the upper mountain, the new snow had seen little settling, and untracked areas skied like dense powder vs. any sort of mush. At all elevations, even where the snow was transitioning due to the above freezing temperatures, it seemed to be doing it a subtle way. It wasn’t sticky, just dense, and perhaps that slow change was due to the cold overnight temperatures and the overcast keeping away dramatic warming from direct sunlight. In thinner areas where the new snow had melted back, the skiing typically transitioned right to the underlying corn snow, and that skied really well. It was sort of strange to move from areas of dense powder skiing, right to spring corn snow, but somehow it worked. In any event, the water bottle ended up being right where we thought it was, so that part of the tour was quite successful. A few shots I took during yesterday’s tour:

Yeah, I guess one positive way to think about it is that they have a lot of ski days under their belts, and they'll have those skills for a lifetime. My son said he had what was probably his best Telemark day ever in terms of comfort level and confidence with his turns, so they're still learning and improving, even at this age.

With the snow from this latest storm, my wife and I headed up to Bolton for a session yesterday with our older son, who is back from school on spring break. We got to the mountain reasonably early, with some concern about how the powder was going to hold up as the day warmed, but even as of midday that wasn’t a concern at elevation. It was probably in the 20s F when we arrived, and combined with the breeze, it was chilly. It was excellent touring weather, and the powder stayed cold and dry. Even at midday, the higher elevation snow was dry, although snow in the mid to lower elevations in directly sunlight was starting to be affected by the sun. The mountain was reporting 4 inches of new snow, but I’d say that was a fairly conservative report – I was finding 5-6” new at the 2,000’ elevation, and as much as 8” up above 3,000’. We started our session with a tour at Wilderness up to ~2,800’ or so. Wilderness is 100% natural snow, so the amount of base in many spots was impressive, but the usual windswept or sunny spots were lean on coverage. Those areas of lean coverage were fine for grassy and/or low angle slopes, but you wouldn’t have wanted to tackle anything steep that didn’t have existing base. I’d say the very best snow we encountered yesterday was on Alta Vista – the ridgeline and skier’s right of the headwall were windswept as usual, the protected left side of the headwall held some nice, semi-packed snow. Below that though was the real gold mine. They had groomed the skier’s left of the trail, but the skier’s right held about 8 inches of chowder that was mostly bottomless, and we couldn’t believe how good the skiing was there. We were wishing they hadn’t groomed anywhere if it could have meant the snow would have been like that. The Vista Quad was on wind hold until about midday though, so we were up on Alta Vista not too long after the lift started running, and I think that helped set up the incredible snow quality there.

Event totals: 1.9” Snow/0.79” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.4 inches New Liquid: 0.02 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 20.0 Snow Density: 5.0% H2O Temperature: 29.5 F Sky: Partly Cloudy Snow at the stake: 1.5 inches

I just looked outside and the precipitation is all snow here at the house. I’m not sure when it changed over, but the snow level has dropped to the valley floor.

It was a busy week, but I’ve had a chance to put together a few more thoughts and shots from Monday. Based on my sessions from Sunday and Monday at Bolton, I wouldn’t put the skiing from the weekend event in the top 20% of the season’s turns, but probably into that next quintile down. It was definitely good, but even in this season, we’ve had a number of better storm cycles in terms of both total liquid equivalent, subsurface quality, and powder quality/dryness. With the continued snowfall, Monday was certainly a bump in accumulations as I noted in my earlier report, and that additional liquid equivalent was enough to bump up the resurfacing to really encompass blue and some black terrain. Monday morning was pretty cold, down in the single digits F, so I found the snow a bit slow except for the less settled/lower density areas. The more consolidated areas of powder with the finer grains or wind-based compaction were just on the slow side due to the combination of temperatures and the snow density. The biggest bump I think this most recent event gets when it comes to the overall quality of the ski experience was due to skier numbers, which were way down. I was touring in the late morning on Monday and there were only 3 or 4 tracks coming down Lower Turnpike where the Wilderness Uphill Route is located. A typical midseason day would definitely have seen more activity by that point. Sure, it was a Monday, but Sunday was sort of the same; it’s just that time of year when many people don’t have the drive to ski because it’s no winter where they are, or they’ve moved on to other activities, or whatever. That’s of course one of the reasons March and April are so great in the mountains, as your images have been showing. Anyway, I’ve got a few more shots below – the first one was a leftover from Sunday that I didn’t get to post, and the others are from Monday’s session. It is nice to see another round of snow hitting the mountains now, so maybe we’ll get a chance for more fun this weekend.

I just checked the BV webcam at 2,000’ and they’re getting some solid snowfall with accumulation down to that elevation now. I’m not sure if Mother Nature intends to keep it up at that intensity all night, but that would set up some great turns tomorrow. I’m sure those 30-40 db echoes are helping the matter.

I’ve been seeing the potential for snow on the back side of this system since the end of the last one, and there’s certainly a signal there on the models like the GFS and NAM that typically pick it up. It’s already snowing at ridgeline level based on the view from the Sugarbush 3,900’ snow stake webcam, and the snow levels are expected to drop to even the lower valleys tonight. I see the BTV NWS is thinking the potential for 3-6” above 2,500’, so we’ll certainly be watching. It could be nice timing for Saturday morning turns. Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Burlington VT 1014 AM EDT Fri Apr 1 2022 NEAR TERM /THROUGH SATURDAY/...For VT a similar type scenario will unfold, but colder air in the mid/upper slopes arrives slightly later. Expecting snow levels above 2500 feet thru 18z, supported by progged 850mb temps btwn -1C and -3C, while 925mb temps hover on either side of 0C. However, similar to NY zones, expect snow levels in VT to quickly lower by 21z, as 925mb temps drop below 0C and fall btwn -1C and -4C by 00z this evening. Total snow accumulations wl be dusting to 2 inches below 1500 feet, 2 to 4 inches 1500 to 2500 feet and 3 to 6 inches above 2500 feet in the favorable upslope regions of the central- northern Greens from Mt Allen to Mansfield to Jay Peak area.

Event totals: 3.6” Snow/0.27” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.8 inches New Liquid: 0.03 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 26.7 Snow Density: 3.8% H2O Temperature: 17.4 F Sky: Light Snow (2-10 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 1.5 inches

Event totals: 2.8” Snow/0.24” L.E. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.2 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 20.0 Snow Density: 5.0% H2O Temperature: 13.5 F Sky: Light Snow (1-3 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 1.5 inches

I’ve added the north to south listing of available snowfall totals from the Vermont ski areas for the current event. The lack of notable snow at Burke would suggest that resorts off the spine have not seen much accumulation this far, but the resorts of the Northern Greens had fairly consistent reports of accumulations approaching the 1-foot mark. With Sugarbush reporting 6”, and MRG clearly not getting enough to consider opening for midweek service, it looked like a typical trend of snowfall dropping off south of the Northern Greens, but the Killington/Pico area clearly bucked that trend, so perhaps they were under a streamer or something along those lines. Jay Peak: 10” Burke: T” Smuggler’s Notch: 10” Stowe: 11” Bolton Valley: 12” Sugarbush: 6” Middlebury: T” Pico: 12” Killington: 12” Okemo: 2” Bromley: 4” Stratton: 2” Mount Snow: 1”

With the way it was pounding heavy snow when I left Bolton yesterday, and their morning report indicating a foot of snow for the storm total at that point, I figured another ski session was in order. Snow levels had dropped all the way to the valleys yesterday, but they really didn’t start picking up much accumulation until the evening. Even the valleys were coated in white this morning, so accumulations started there, and I’ve updated yesterday’s accumulations profile with the numbers I saw this morning: 340’: 0” --> 1-2” 1,000’: T --> 2” 1,200’: 1” --> 2-3” 1,500’: 2” --> 3” 2,000’: 4” --> 5” 2,500’: 5” --> 6” 3,000’: 6” 3,300’: 6”+ Today’s tour only brought me up to ~2,700’, so I can’t update those numbers from the higher elevations, but the trend between the additional snowfall and settling seemed to be to tack on another inch or two to what was present yesterday afternoon. When I first got up to the mountain this morning, I encountered blizzard like conditions due to the snowfall and wind, and the wind was certainly stronger than I saw at any point yesterday. Like yesterday, the snow would often come in pulses – you’d have light to moderate snowfall with a brightening of the sky, and then visibility would drop and you’d encounter heavy snow. At one point on today’s tour, intense snow came on so fast that visibility dropped to ~100 feet in just seconds. I was in the middle of taking some photos, and will end up having to use some of the initial exposures because part of what I was shooting about 200 feet away literally became invisible behind the snowfall, and I just had to move on. I’ll put together some images and a bit about the ski conditions as soon as I get a chance.

There was a prominent stream of moisture sitting there visible on the radar with some of those yellow 30+ db echoes. It was right down there in Addison County and upstream of Sugarbush/MRG, so I was wondering if they were getting hit, but the valley certainly got in on it based on those numbers.

Event totals: 2.6” Snow/0.23” L.E. Details from the 12:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.6 inches New Liquid: 0.04 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 15.0 Snow Density: 6.7% H2O Temperature: 21.0 F Sky: Snow (2-8 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 1.5 inches

Event totals: 2.0” Snow/0.19” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.3 inches New Liquid: 0.06 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 21.7 Snow Density: 4.6% H2O Temperature: 12.0 F Sky: Light Snow (1 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 1.5 inches

It’s back to winter indeed. Even with your timely snow updates providing knowledge of how much snow fell and how it was skiing on Mansfield, you really never know quite how it’s going to be until you get up there. I’d seen Bolton’s initial morning report of 1-3” in the 2,000’-3,000’ elevation range, so when I found 2” at the Timberline Base at 1,500’ on the way up the Access Road, I knew the accumulations had been increasing through the morning. I detailed the accumulations profile in my previous post, but this was one of those days where it was definitely nice to be able to start touring above 2,000’ with the elevation dependence. As of midday, there was already a solid resurfacing of the low angle terrain, so aside from any scoured areas, the powder on that terrain was skiing beautifully. Even low-angle terrain that had been skier packed was excellent, so this new snow had adhered nicely to the subsurface. On one of my lift-served runs, I saw this in play with the quiet turns of skiers on Bear Run and Sprig O’ Pine as I passed over on the Vista Quad. I’m not sure how much liquid equivalent has been put down at elevation with this storm, since we’re certainly not getting as much liquid down here in the valley as the mountains are. We’ve had about 0.12” of liquid from this event down here, but based on how the powder turns felt today, the mountains had probably seen 0.3-0.5” up high as of midday? That’s an estimate of course, and PF can weigh in with his thoughts. Anyway, medium angle terrain was a mixed bag in terms of sufficient resurfacing. In areas of untracked powder over at Wilderness, I was generally getting bottomless turns even up to some single black terrain. There were some great turns in areas that hadn’t been scoured. When I was over skiing the lift-served terrain on Vista though, you were definitely getting down to the old base on the blues and blacks – there certainly hasn’t been enough liquid equivalent put down with this event to hold up to those levels of skier traffic. But in terms of not quite knowing what it’s going to be like until you get there, today definitely delivered. The quality kept me around for some lift-served runs even after touring, although I was able to connect over to parts of Wilderness on those runs for powder laps. Overall, the snow was great, and so was the scenery, since it was often pounding snow with big flakes, but the light levels were pretty high because it’s now late March. A few shots from the day:

I headed up to Bolton for a midday session, so I can pass along some snow observations. I started out with a tour up to the Wilderness Summit at ~3,150’, and someone had also broken trail up Ricker Mountain, so I followed that for a bit and probably topped out around 3,300’. The powder skiing was great, so I hung around for some lift-served laps as well. It was snowing all the way down to the valley floor, but accumulations didn’t start until ~1,000’. Here’s the accumulations profile I found around midday: 340’: 0” 1,000’: T 1,200’: 1” 1,500’: 2” 2,000’: 4” 2,500’: 5” 3,000’: 6” 3,300’: 6”+ Once above the 2,000’ level, there weren’t any massive increases in accumulations that I saw, just sort of slow, steady increase, as the profile shows. The powder was meaty like you said, so powder turns were great. The snowfall ranged from huge, pounding flakes, to lighter episodes where the snow continued, but the sky would brighten. It was really pounding when I left, and made me want to stay for another run or two. I’m not sure if it can keep up at today’s snowfall pace overnight, but tomorrow would obviously be another great day if it did. I’ll put together some images and a bit more info when I get a chance.

That’s great to hear. It’s been a bit slow over the past week as you’ve noted, with just a couple inches here and there, but this should give us a bit more to play with. It’s the Northern Greens, and it’s only March, so it’s good to see an uptick with still April to go.