J.Spin

Event totals: 0.5” Snow/0.06” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.1 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 10.0 Snow Density: 10.0% H2O Temperature: 35.8 F Sky: Partly Cloudy Snow at the stake: 20.5 inches

Event totals: 0.4” Snow/0.05” L.E. Details from the 10:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.4 inches New Liquid: 0.05 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 8.0 Snow Density: 12.5% H2O Temperature: 32.9 F Sky: Light Snow (2-5 mm) Snow at the stake: 21.0 inches

Event totals: 3.0” Snow/0.19” L.E. It looks like the totals above will be the final values for this event, so that seems right in line with the 1-3”/2-4” that was in our BTV NWS point forecast. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.1 inches New Liquid: Trace Temperature: 27.0 F Sky: Flurries Snow at the stake: 23.0 inches

Event totals: 2.9” Snow/0.19” L.E. Details from the 12:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.6 inches New Liquid: 0.07 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 22.9 Snow Density: 4.4% H2O Temperature: 27.0 F Sky: Cloudy Snow at the stake: 23.5 inches

We talked about that fantastic snow up in Big Jay Basin on Saturday, and it just kept accumulating throughout the time I was there. Here at the house, the snowfall really ramped up on Saturday night, and I figured it had to really be unloading up there in the basin, so I told the family and we all headed out for a tour on Sunday. The weather was quite a contrast between Saturday and yesterday – Saturday was relatively low visibility with constant snowfall, but yesterday there was hardly a cloud in the sky. The basin area had definitely picked up more snow since I’d left on Saturday, but it was most notable above the road elevation (~1,500’). On Saturday, I found powder in the 8-12” range down there, and it was probably closer to a consistent 12” on Sunday. Up higher, I’d found 12-16” in the 2,500’ range, but my measurements show that the powder depth had increased to roughly 20” when we were there yesterday afternoon. If one considers how dry that snow was, and whatever settling occurred, that was obviously another impressive shot of snow on Saturday night. A few shots from yesterday’s tour in Big Jay Basin:

Yeah, the daytime snow in general seemed to just accumulate at a steady pace with those synoptic-like flakes, but it’s been much more potent more recently this evening with that heavier band pushing toward the spine. Indeed, as I saw mentioned in the thread, there wasn’t much happening in the Champlain Valley today. When I was driving home, though, it quickly became obvious that it was one of those days where the mountains were getting hit. Flakes appeared around Williston, and the snowfall intensity just continued to ramp up each mile as I pushed farther and farther into the mountains. Those drive are always fun because the increase happens gradually, and by the time I reach the house it can be pounding snow, but you’re a bit desensitized to be able to compare to what it was like earlier in the drive. It wasn’t quite like that today, but it was certainly a steady, moderate snowfall here at the house.

Yeah, when I made my analyses earlier this evening, the stack on the snowboard had that obvious heft to it like synoptic snow. And your estimate was good – it was actually slightly higher than 10:1 here at 10.8:1, but I’m sure it’s ±10:1 all around our general area.

Event totals: 1.3” Snow/0.12” L.E. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.3 inches New Liquid: 0.12 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 10.8 Snow Density: 9.2% H2O Temperature: 28.0 F Sky: Snow (3-8 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 22.0 inches

Event totals: 7.7” Snow/0.16” L.E. After a little more snow this morning, we cleared out, so these should be the final totals at our site for Winter Storm Viola. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.2 inches New Liquid: Trace Temperature: 14.9 F Sky: Mostly Clear Snow at the stake: 21.5 inches

Event totals: 7.5” Snow/0.16” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.7 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 70.0 Snow Density: 1.4% H2O Temperature: 18.1 F Sky: Light Snow (1-8 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 23.5 inches

Event totals: 6.8” Snow/0.15” L.E. Details from the 12:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 3.1 inches New Liquid: 0.06 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 51.7 Snow Density: 1.9% H2O Temperature: 20.1 F Sky: Light Snow (4-20 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 24.0 inches

Below I’ve got some shots from my travels around the area today along with ski touring in the Big Jay Basin area and the east face of Big Jay. One definite theme out there today was a lot of visages of the sun through moderate to heavy snow with big flakes.

Oh yeah, that disparity is not quite as high as it would usually be. It’s due to a combination of that big storm with the intense band hitting farther south, and also, the Northern Greens are off their usual snowfall numbers for this point in the season due to that slower start. I’m sure PF can indicate what the snowfall pace is at Stowe relative to average. Average seasonal snowfall here at our site through 2/20 is ~110”, so based on the usual correlation, the local resorts should be somewhere in the 220” range, with Jay Peak on the higher side of that.

I actually did pop over to Sushi Yoshi to get dinner for the family on the way back from Jay Peak this afternoon, and I’d say even that little bit of distance up there from the center of Stowe Village showed some increased accumulations and retention of the fluff to help cover things. I assume it must continue to get better as one heads farther up the Mountain Road?

I was on Big Jay and in the Big Jay Basin area today, so that southeast side of Jay Peak seemed to really get quite a shot of new snow. I can’t say when all of it fell, and I believe I only saw 3” new on the snow report for the resort this morning when I checked. I actually never headed over the pass to the resort side, but I was wondering what it was like in terms of new snow over there. Whatever the setup has been in terms of wind direction and Froude, etc., that Big Jay Basin area today was definitely getting hit. Something similar was going on with Hyde Park and Eden as well, to a lesser degree of course. I actually headed up to the Jay Peak area to tour today because it seemed like they’d generally avoided that mixed precipitation earlier in the week from Winter Storm Uri. Indeed, they did avoid any real crust from what I saw, so obviously that’s going to help a lot with respect to the quality of the subsurface. The resort reported 6-8” from that storm, and although there wasn’t a crust, that snow was still dense. The skiing was indeed fantastic, and as I mentioned, I found as much as 16” of champagne in that area. Compared to last weekend, one can definitely nitpick a bit on the quality of the powder skiing though. The most recent snow is so ridiculously light that it’s easy to get down to the dense Winter Storm Uri snow if you’re on more than moderate/blue pitch. Then you get to that region of dense snow, and if you pressure hard enough, you’ll collapse that layer a bit because the powder below it is less dense. Essentially, the snowpack’s got an upside down issue with respect to those second and third layers down. We’re very much talking first-world powder problems here of course, but I figured it would be good to get the beta out there for anyone else thinking of heading out. Naturally, going as fat as you can will help with respect to staying up in the champagne layer, and heck, if it dumps more tonight, that surface layer of powder will be bolstered to make it even better.

Are you guys getting snow from this current pulse? The BTV NWS AFD did say low Froude Numbers at first (which I think relates to what I saw in the east side towns today), but I think the Froude was supposed to increase eventually.

Yeah, my snow had totally evaporated from both my elevated and ground boards as well today! I measured the most recent 0.6” before heading off for my ski tour in the late morning, and when I got home this evening it was gone. If it accumulated any higher, I’ll never know, since I wasn’t here. It’s such angel dust that it just sublimates I guess. I could tell that it had at least 0.01” of liquid when I was measuring it based on experience, and that would put it right in line with the previous reading as well, so that seemed like the correct L.E. to go with.

Snowfall was actually rather light when I got home earlier today, with just some 1-2 mm flakes falling, but there’s been a pulse of moisture that’s come in from the NNW direction on the radar, and snowfall has really picked up. The flakes are back up in size, with some more than an inch in diameter, and I’d say snowfall is in the 1”/hr range due to those large flakes. The models have been suggesting that there would be a bit of a resurgence in the snowfall this evening.

I actually went right through your area today on my way up to borderwx and bwt’s neck of the wood’s for a ski tour, so I can pass along some snow updates. There have definitely been some notable differences in snowfall around the area. The rounds of fluff we’ve been getting here along the spine at our site have covered up the old snow pretty well, and monitoring that aesthetic during my travels today turned out to be a decent way to see who’d recently gotten snow. Heading east from our place, accumulations definitely drop off toward the Waterbury Village area, and indeed, all along through the east slope towns of Waterbury Center, Stowe, and Morrisville, there really hasn’t been much new snow that I could see, or what’s fallen has sublimated and disappeared quickly off the snow banks. I’m sure accumulations increase as one heads westward up the mountain road, but down in Stowe Village, I could see that they need a refresher. There was still light snow falling in all those east side towns, but once I left Morrisville and rose up into the Hyde Park area, the increase in snowfall intensity was obvious. That continued right on through Eden. The snowfall was squally, and quite heavy at times, and I was continually having to turn on my headlights and fogs when I’d get into those more intense areas of snowfall. That increased snowfall definitely showed itself with accumulations – up in that area, all the roadside snowbanks were covered up with a solid coating of new snow. I’d say the snow was in general a bit less through Belvidere and Montgomery Center, but once I headed toward the pass on Route 242… well, you guys know what happens up there. I parked at that lower access area on the east side of the pass where I started my tour. The elevation there is about 1,500’ and right from the start of the tour, I was finding 8-12” of new champagne. Above 2,000’ there was 12-16” of accumulation. I was checking snowpack depths along my tour, and I was already getting 40” snowpack readings at just 2,000’. And, it snowed the whole time I was there – most of the time it was what I’d call moderate, probably in the 0.5”/hr range, but there were also stints where it bumped up to the 1”/hr range. The snowfall was typically large, upslope-style flakes, so it can be tough to gauge the snowfall rate with those at times because they just stack up so fast. It’s firsthand experiences like this though that have me rolling my eyes every time somebody gets going with the smack talk about Jay Peak and their snow reporting. My actual experiences reveal again, and again, and again that they really get a ridiculous amount of snow in that area. I’ll put together some images from today’s trip when I get a chance.

Event totals: 3.7” Snow/0.09” L.E. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.6 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 60.0 Snow Density: 1.7% H2O Temperature: 21.0 F Sky: Light Snow (1-2 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 21.0 inches

It looks like there’s the potential for a bit more with a resurgence this afternoon into the overnight: Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Burlington VT 711 AM EST Sat Feb 20 2021 .NEAR TERM /THROUGH SUNDAY/... As of 711 AM EST Saturday...The upslope component will be a major factor for snowfall today, especially later in the afternoon into the evening when it appears shortwave energy will help deepen the cloud layer to support more widespread and heavier orographic snow showers. Given 850 millibar temperatures around -15 celsius, Froude numbers generally 0.5 to 1, and northwest flow in the 925-850 millibar layer, snowfall should be efficient in the spine of the Greens and have a 24 hour total of 3 to 5 inches in this area, with 1 to 3 inches elsewhere in the higher terrain of the Adirondacks and Greens, and most valley locations will be dry or see just some flurries.

Event totals: 3.1” Snow/0.08” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.8 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 80.0 Snow Density: 1.3% H2O Temperature: 18.1 F Sky: Light Snow (3-15 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 21.5 inches

Event totals: 2.3” Snow/0.07” L.E. Details from the 12:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.0 inches New Liquid: 0.03 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 33.3 Snow Density: 3.0% H2O Temperature: 25.3 F Sky: Light Snow (2-12 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 21.0 inches

Yeah, it looks like a good stretch – I’m seeing four systems suggested in the near future on the GFS and other models: 1. The current backside snow of Winter Storm Viola, which the models suggest should run through about midday Sunday 2. Monday into Tuesday, there’s a low pressure system and surface cold front crossing the region 3. Tuesday night into Wednesday, a weak low pressure system passing north of the area 4. Thursday, another system potentially moving along the international border The BTV NWS discussion mentions all of them except the last one, but not any accumulations details at this point of course. The mountains will do what they do with them in any event. That looks like some classic NNE mountain weather though, and it seems like there’s a lot of northern stream vibe to it, so reliability should be up there. It should be fun to watch them continue to put the fluff down on the slopes and hopefully increase the fun factor for any off piste spots that got hardened by that last storm. Based on the numbers, I think it calls for this one…

Event totals: 1.3” Snow/0.04” L.E. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.5 inches New Liquid: 0.02 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 25.0 Snow Density: 4.0% H2O Temperature: 27.9 F Sky: Light Snow (2-10 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 20.5 inches