J.Spin

Today turned out to be sort of a bit of a midwinter gem, which is pretty nice considering winter just started. I hadn’t expected it to be quite so stunning, but with the recent snows, it was clearly a good day to head up to Bolton for a tour and check out how the powder had settled in. In the morning, before any clouds rolled it, the sun and sky were simply brilliant. And that’s the first thing I noticed when I got out of the car at the mountain. And I couldn’t believe how hot the sun felt. We’re up near 45 N latitude, and this time of year is just about as low a sun angle as we get, so all I can think is that I’m just not used to actually having the sun shining on my face. I had a 23% VLT lens in my goggles, figuring that sure, it was sunny, but it’s late December way up here in the north. Well, I could have easily gone with something sub-10% VLT; it was that bright. The powder definitely exceeded expectations today – I found settled depths of roughly 5-7” above the subsurface at 2,000’, and many spots with 8-10” up near 3,000’. I initially couldn’t figure out where all of it had come from, but then I realized that since the 4-5” from Winter Storm Gail, it’s just continued to snow with these past couple of smaller systems. The Wilderness skin track was in excellent shape, and it almost looked like the resort had groomed the adjoining Turnpike trail because it was so smoothly packed. It’s possible that it was just very nicely packed by skier traffic, but for folks looking for groomed turns in the Wilderness area, it’s good to go. Off the main route though, there was tons of untracked powder available, and it was definitely right-side-up, midwinter quality stuff. That synoptic snow from Winter Storm Gail, topped off with the drier snow from these last couple of systems has really put together a quality surface. Low-angle stuff is good to go, and even moderate-angle slopes are nice if the snow is protected from the wind and there hasn’t been any skier traffic. Above those angles though, the snowpack is definitely not ready yet; the base is just not deep enough. It’s going to be interesting to see how things play out for this next week. This next storm looks to consolidate the base, and there are a couple of potential systems behind it that could make some nice conditions atop that if they came to fruition on the snowy side of things. I’ve added a couple of shots from today’s tour below – that first one is definitely representative of what the skies were like in the morning.

I asked him and he just sort of shrugged. He didn’t really say much, so I assume he hadn’t given it much thought.

Snow just started falling in association with this next system. When I was on the mountain this morning it was wall to wall brilliant sunshine, but clouds had quickly built in to create very overcast skies when I was leaving after noontime. I thought this was a new system that just sort of snuck in here, but I guess it’s actually front end precipitation from Winter Storm Harold. The BTV NWS isn’t saying much about the snow at this point, but you can see the precipitation building in on the local radar:

I saw this when I was browsing through the main December thread – you are definitely starting to get a feel for your location in winter. It’s not that anyone is against big synoptic systems or anything, they can deliver a lot of snow and really put down a base. But, trying to live off those types of storms in terms of supplying continuous snow for winter-related industries and pursuits is just a massive, season-long crapshoot unless you are in some sort of perfect pattern. I guess that’s why so much of the discussion in the forum is focused around watching for good/great winter weather patterns to develop. This statement was great: “Two weak systems swing through and drop snow on me followed by some upslope. That works here.” Yeah, in terms of snowfall, that’s literally our…

Event totals: 1.8” Snow/0.09” L.E. I see a few flurries out there, but the point forecast here doesn’t call for any snow today, so this may be the last round of accumulation for this event. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.2 inches New Liquid: Trace Temperature: 21.4 F Sky: Flurries Snow at the stake: 4.0 inches

Oh man, RFID is just so good from a skier’s perspective. We’ve loved using ours at Stowe over the past several years, and with Bolton converting over to RFID last season, it’s been even better. I just stick my passes in my shoulder pocket, and literally forget about them. Even keeping both my Stowe and Bolton passes right together in the same pocket has been no trouble. Gone are the days of fumbling around in the lift line to show your pass, especially on storm days when it’s just dumping, and the last thing you want to have to do is take off your gloves, search around to pull out your pass, etc., etc. Bolton doesn’t typically have much in the way of lift queues to begin with, but we haven’t experienced any sort of issues, just smooth sailing onto the lifts through the automated gates without even having to trouble any of the lift attendants. I have to think it’s pretty cost effective if even Bolton Valley is willing to invest in it for all their lifts.

Event totals: 1.6” Snow/0.09” L.E. Details from the 10:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.3 inches New Liquid: 0.02 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 15.0 Snow Density: 6.7% H2O Temperature: 29.5 F Sky: Light Snow (1 to 12 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 4.0 inches

That's very interesting. I was gone for most of the work day hours, but everything I’ve seen here at our site has been solid flakes – certainly a collection of sizes, but definitely real dendrites. Density at 4:00 P.M. observations came in at 8.8% H2O, which is certainly not fluff, but definitely sub-10% H2O. I wonder if we’re getting flakes from sites of better lift – the BTV NWS did say the Froude Numbers suggested blocked flow at first, and then unblocked by the afternoon into the evening. Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Burlington VT 700 PM EST Tue Dec 22 2020 NEAR TERM /THROUGH WEDNESDAY NIGHT/... As of 700 PM EST Tuesday...Northwest-southeast oriented snow bands have developed across the North Country in response to cooling aloft in the wake of weak cold front, with widespread upslope snow showers in the favored areas of the northern Greens, Adirondacks, and Northeast Kingdom persisting. Froude numbers continue to support unblocked flow that favors the aforementioned areas in Vermont to continue seeing snow showers until the relative humidity in the cloud layer dwindles after midnight, with other areas with minimal precipitation chances by this evening.

Event totals: 1.3” Snow/0.07” L.E. When I headed off to Burlington this morning we had some steady snowfall with fairly large flakes, and the snowfall intensity only seemed to diminish slightly as I dropped down to Bolton Flats. By the time I got to Burlington, the snowfall had mostly dissipated, but I think that was the trend throughout the area; checking our webcam didn’t reveal any substantial accumulations beyond what had already come down. Returning home this afternoon though, the snow really ramped up as I approached the house, and we’ve had some rather heavy bouts of snowfall with flakes up to about an inch in diameter. Details from the 4:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.8 inches New Liquid: 0.07 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 11.4 Snow Density: 8.8% H2O Temperature: 33.6 F Sky: Snow (4 to 25 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 4.0 inches

Well, the BTV NWS is certainly watching this event and keeping the skiers informed. The AFD format doesn’t incorporate graphics of course, but if it did, we know what image they’d put in with the text. Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Burlington VT 631 AM EST Tue Dec 22 2020 .NEAR TERM /THROUGH WEDNESDAY/... As of 624 AM EST Tuesday... Water vapor shows mid/upper lvl trof deepening acrs the ne conus as several embedded vorts rotate acrs the fa. First piece of energy moves acrs northern NY/VT between 09-15z this morning, with the first round of light precip, with next short energy crossing the area btwn 21z-03z this evening. Initially flow is highly block with froude <0.50 thru 18z this aftn, but quickly becomes unblocked by 20z, as mixing develops under moderately strong llvl caa. Parameters look very favorable for a period of accumulating upslope snow showers today into tonight, especially northern dacks and from Mt Mansfield to Jay Peak. Have noticed good 925mb to 700mb moisture profiles, favorable 925mb to 850mb winds of 25 to 40 knots, moderately strong llvl caa, and good rh in snow growth region. Based on this info, have bumped snowfall amounts up slightly in the highest peaks acrs the dacks and northern Greens, with localized 4 to 6 inches possible by Weds morning, making for some sneaky good turns for skier and riders on Weds.

Event totals: 0.5” Snow/Trace L.E. There must have been a period of very large flakes before observations time, because the accumulation on the boards had that look, and the water content spoke to how dry it was. The snow falling at observations time was made of smaller flakes and was very light, but at times there have been some upticks in the snowfall rate since then. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.5 inches New Liquid: Trace Temperature: 29.7 F Sky: Light Snow (1 to 3 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 4.0 inches

Event totals: 1.0” Snow/0.07” L.E. We didn’t pick up any additional snow beyond what accumulated yesterday evening, so the above totals should be the final numbers for this event. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.2 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 20.0 Snow Density: 5.0% H2O Temperature: 27.9 F Sky: Mostly Cloudy Snow at the stake: 4.5 inches

Event totals: 0.8” Snow/0.06” L.E. We had radar echoes overhead for quite a while this afternoon here at our site, but it took a while for snow to actually present itself visually, presumably due to required moistening in the atmosphere. Once it did get going, the snowfall rate was pretty heavy there for a bit, with flakes up to ¾” with a mix of other flake sizes. As of the 6:00 P.M. observations time, the snowfall rate had tapered back to something lighter however. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.8 inches New Liquid: 0.06 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 13.3 Snow Density: 7.5% H2O Temperature: 26.2 F Sky: Light Snow (1 to 4 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 4.5 inches

Snow just started falling here in Waterbury.

How a system like that one is going to play out for someone in your location is often night and day compared to what happens along the coast of SNE; for a spot like Jay Peak, we’re not even talking in the realm of miracles for a decent outcome. It’s essentially the counterpoint to what went on during Winter Storm Gail in the Jay Peak area – while that type of an event is sort of a one-off/occasional thing, the look of the next week is more of a typical winter reality result. There are actually four potential snow events in the next week though (today, Tue/Wed, Fri, and Sat/Sun), and that’s a pretty respectable pace, even for the Northern Greens.

I’ve seen that effect, and it’s very cool. I was also going to comment that there could be some real diamond dust out there too – we had some yesterday, and I just hopped on now to comment that we’ve got a bit falling this morning as well.

I added some of the relevant text from that discussion above – and you’ll see at the end that I was hoping you would weigh in. Indeed, it’s got to be exactly the right combination of very casual skier who doesn’t ski frequently enough to really pay attention to ski resort snow reports and doesn’t really follow winter weather enough to know much about what happens with respect to regional snowfall outside of the large, publicized storms. The topic even coming up in conversation is going to be limited though, because the type of person with that perception is just not typically even going to be talking about the nuances of which parts of VT get the most snow. I know I’ve encountered this perception, and can recall a specific example in a discussion at the First Tracks ski forum, but maybe it’s not as common as I thought if you’ve never encountered it.

I put together the north to south listing of available snowfall totals from the Vermont ski areas for Winter Storm Gail. The data show the trend of snowfall peaking around Okemo, and falling off to the north and south. The totals tapered off very quickly north of the Pico/Killington area, and nothing new was reported in the far northern part of the state by either Jay Peak or Burke. The relative accumulations aren’t perfectly reversed relative to more typical events, since Mount Snow isn’t reporting the highest total, but this could easily be one of those events from which casual observers in the big cities get the impression that the Southern Vermont Ski Areas have the highest annual snowfall averages. As we talked about in the ski thread, when the big coastal cities are affected with snow from a substantial coastal storm such that it gets a lot of publicity, it’s typically those ski areas down south that have higher accumulations. This is just the theory mind you, but we know the perception comes from somewhere, and that might explain it. Jay Peak: 0” Burke: 0” Smuggler’s Notch: 3” Stowe: 3” Bolton Valley: 4” Mad River Glen: 6” Sugarbush: 4” Pico: 25” Killington: 25” Okemo: 35” Bromley: 33” Magic Mountain: 30” Stratton: 24” Mount Snow: 26”

I wasn’t expecting to ski this storm at all, and hadn’t even been paying attention to it until Phin popped into the thread and gave us a heads up. But it definitely put down some liquid equivalent, even this far north. When I made noon observations today and saw that we’d picked up almost a half an inch of liquid equivalent by that point, I figured it was worth a quick tour to see how conditions were faring up at Bolton. They’ve got the elevation, but they’re also a few miles farther to the northwest of our site, so accumulations I found at 2,000’ in the Village were 4-5”, roughly the same as what we picked up here at the house. I’m not sure how low in elevation it goes, but there was still decent base snow left at 2,000’, so low-angle powder turns were quite smooth and bottomless on fat skis with the L.E. that just fell. Snowfall has been in a bit of a lull in the past few days, but the pattern looks like it’s picking up in the coming week, with potentially three systems that could bring snow. The BTV NWS isn’t saying too much about that Sunday through Wednesday period at this point, but it certainly looks like some bread and butter potential for the mountains. Even the usual modest amounts could be great atop the snow from this recent system.

Event totals: 4.9” Snow/0.50” L.E. I must have been up at the mountain when the storm finished up here, but the top half inch or so of accumulation from the most recent round of snow contained notably larger dendrites with a much more impressive ability to coruscate light compared to the small flakes from much of the storm. The last vestiges of snowfall have definitely cleared out to partly cloudy skies, so I’d say the above totals are the final numbers here for Winter Storm Gail. As the models have been showing, there really isn’t much lingering upslope on the back side of this system, probably due to the way it’s pulling quickly off to the east and not northward into the Maritimes. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.8 inches New Liquid: 0.05 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 16.0 Snow Density: 6.3% H2O Temperature: 11.7 F Sky: Partly Cloudy Snow at the stake: 5.0 inches

That’s interesting, it looks like they’re rounding most (but not all?) of the CoCoRaHS observations to the nearest half inch? I reported 1.9” of accumulation at my 6:00 A.M. observations, so it’s funny to see 2.0” listed for this site.

Event totals: 4.1” Snow/0.45” L.E. The density of this morning’s snowfall was quite similar to what we picked up during the overnight period, but the few bouts of larger flakes we had seemed to drop it down just a bit. Details from the 12:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 2.2 inches New Liquid: 0.23 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 9.6 Snow Density: 10.5% H2O Temperature: 19.4 F Sky: Snow (1 to 3 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 4.0 inches

Event totals: 1.9” Snow/0.22” L.E. I don’t know exactly what time the snow began here at our location, but the last time I’d looked outside before heading off to bed was around midnight, so it was some point after that. The snow during this morning’s observations was falling quite steadily, and both the snow falling and the snow stacks on the boards had that synoptic look. Measuring the accumulation was very easy due to the extremely flat and even stack made of relatively small crystals. There was a lot of moisture in just the couple inches of accumulation, and indeed there’s a really good shot of liquid equivalent in there with snow density of 11-12% H2O. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.9 inches New Liquid: 0.22 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 8.6 Snow Density: 11.6% H2O Temperature: 15.8 F Sky: Snow (1 to 4 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 2.0 inches

I hadn’t even been paying attention to this next storm (Winter Storm Gail) because the general discussion I’d seen earlier suggested it was pretty much a Mid-Atlantic thing, but then Phin popped into the thread and said not to sleep on it up here. That was a timely wake up call, because it does actually look like we could even get a bit of snow this far north. I’ve got the latest BTV NWS maps for the storm below. There are Winter Storm Warnings and Winter Weather Advisories farther south in VT, and the projected accumulations map seems generally in line with the roughly 2-4” in the point forecast for our location.

I checked the BTV NWS AFD regarding the snow was saw today, and it looks like it was due to cold air advection with northwest upslope flow. With the clear and sharp cessation of the snowfall after yesterday’s cold front, it looks like today’s snow is part of a discrete event. Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Burlington VT 1212 PM EST Tue Dec 15 2020 NEAR TERM /THROUGH WEDNESDAY/... …Otherwise, nw upslope flw and caa has resulted in remaining moisture being squeezed out acrs the mountains, with additional clouds and a few flurries. Expect these to dissipate by noon, as moisture decreases.