J.Spin

The snow from this morning tapered off during the midday period, but flakes are starting to appear again, so this may be the next phase of this system working into the area.

I didn’t see any sort accumulation around here this morning aside from what appeared to be some leftover frozen drops from yesterday’s precipitation. We’ve got some flakes around now though, so the atmosphere is definitely back into a snow profile.

LOL, nice perspective PF. At the moment, the NVT crew are probably about the only folks Phin could go in the entire Northeastern U.S. and get any thoughts of sympathy with respect to snowfall issues.

Yes, help Phin out! He needs assistance shaking whatever Mid-Atlantic mindset he’s got as he tries to transform into a NNEer.

Ah, now you’re talking like a NNEer – this area is pretty good when it comes to getting back to the snow business after warm interludes. As I mentioned, even though every storm won’t necessarily be all snow, just about every storm that hits us from here on out will have a really good shot of having some snow/frozen. Heck even this next batch of potential snow with the squalls you mentioned is backside snow from Winter Storm Dane that has been hitting those areas south of the lakes with snow, but giving generally rain this far to the east. It sat there for a bit, but it’s moving on now and bringing the cold/snow through.

That is a bit off the normal November snowfall pace over there in your area – I think you said the average inches of snow for November there were probably in the mid-teens, which is similar to what my data indicate here. You guys had more October snowfall than we did over here though, so I bet you’re not too far off normal pace on the season overall. Average daily snowfall really starts to ramp up now that we’re into December though, moving into the 1-2” per day range, and with the pattern that the models show, snow should pick right up as your neighbors suggest.

Yeah, cold air and snow profiles are building back in as we speak. Most models show 3 to 4 potential shots of snow in just the next 7 to 8 days, so buckle up for some typical NNE December weather. Potential coastal systems often get the most attention, but up here we know not to overlook the…

November Totals Accumulating Storms: 6 Snowfall: 23.3” Liquid Equivalent: 3.82” Calendar Year Liquid: 45.95” While we didn’t have one of those early to mid-November starts to the snowpack like we’ve had the past couple of seasons, this was still a decent November for snowfall. It’s interesting to note that despite last November’s snowpack starting on the 8th of the month, it had a fairly average 17.8” of snow, so this month surpassed it in that respect. This November was still well behind the 34.3” from 2018 though.

The issue with the whole “skiing is an expensive sport” myth is that people are generally making a huge “apples to oranges” comparison to so many other sports. The way it should be stated is “modern destination resort alpine skiing has a similar cost to other destination resort experiences”. Soccer is the classic example of a sport played around the world that kids and adults engage in, regardless of their socioeconomic status. As long as you’ve got a ball and you’re not traveling any significant distance to play, it essentially costs nothing. Skiing is the same thing for people living in villages in the Himalaya or similar locations, or in back yards and local hills around the world with snow. You strap some boards on your feet, hike up, and then slide back down with gravity. What most people equate to “skiing” nowadays is actually the equivalent of taking a cruise or going to Disney Land. Nobody talks about how those activities are unfairly priced for individuals with low incomes because they’re essentially frivolous activities that one shouldn’t really be engaging in unless they’ve got substantial expendable income. How many people are going to drive five hours, stay in hotels, eat out at restaurants, and get carted up and down a pristinely irrigated and manicured soccer pitch to get to the specific part of the field they want to be on to kick a soccer ball around? And then when you kick the ball, instead of running to get it, you get back in a cart and are driven to the ball, where you get out and kick it again. Guess what, if you want to do that, it’s probably going to cost you about the same amount as going to “ski” at a ski resort. So if you’re not skiing in your back yard on natural snow under your own power, then you’re darned right it should be expensive. You’re engaging in what is essentially a luxury activity at some remote destination, on snow that potentially had to be made by man… and on top of that you’re being automatically carried up the mountain against the force of gravity. How in any way should that be inexpensive? The actual “soccer” equivalent in skiing is living in the mountains with natural snow and hiking up for turns under your own power in your back yard, or a spot that is at least close enough that you can walk there. Beyond getting yourself some equipment, the cost should basically be the same as playing neighborhood soccer. But that’s not the activity most people think of when “skiing” comes to mind.

When it comes to skiing, I find that it’s generally the skiers who only go out occasionally, or folks that just aren’t that familiar with the sport/industry that believe the “myths” about it being a sport for the wealthy. I guess it’s not necessarily a “myth” insofar as it’s just the obvious part of skiing that they see. If the idea of skiing to someone is owning a place in Aspen that you visit one week a year to ski, then sure, that’s an expensive activity. Or, if you live somewhere in the eastern U.S. megalopolis and take a week trip, or weekend trips where you drive to the resorts, pay for gas, pay for lodging, pay for tickets, pay to rent gear, pay to hit the local restaurants for food, etc., well that probably seems like an expensive activity as well. It’s just that some folks aren’t aware that there are people who live entirely different lifestyles and ski 50, 100, even 150 days a season, for next to nothing. Think about folks who live around here in NNE and work/volunteer at the resorts. Look at what they actually have to deal with from that list of expenses above - they’re essentially paying nothing to ski for an entire season. And it’s not as if you have to work/volunteer in the ski industry – if you don’t want to volunteer or don’t have some connection to the resorts, you can just buy a season’s pass and use it all year for no further expense. OK, so there is an initial up front expense there, but it’s pretty small potatoes if you ski a lot. Or, just backcountry ski, or Nordic ski, or skin up at resorts that don’t require a pass for skinning. Sure, the prototypical “ski trip” is a relatively expensive endeavor, but that idea feels like a myth to those of us who know there are just so many other ways to engage in skiing with so little expense.

Poor Phin; he did point out he’s been sort of traumatized because he’d been shut out of substantial snows in the Mid Atlantic for the past season or two? We’ve just been trying to keep him apprised that the current pace of snowfall around here has been pretty average. Sure there are seasons where the snowpack sets in by early or mid-November, but the average outside the high elevations is more near the end of the month or beginning of December. Snows should be returning around here in the Wednesday timeframe anyway based on the forecast. He should definitely make sure those driveway markers are up at this point.

The folks on the board often discuss it, but SNE had a ridiculous run of winters there for a while. I think I remember someone from CT pointing out a few seasons back how he hadn’t had a below average snowfall winter in perhaps a decade? It was something crazy along those lines. That may have given a bit of an inflated perspective on the snowfall climate, but I’m not sure. Coastal, south of Boston recorded 128” back in 2014-2015, which has got to be what… more than double the average annual snowfall there? Maybe close to triple? You’d think things would have to be lined up perfectly for that sort of magic, and I don’t suspect that can happen every year. Up here, I’m sure everyone would love to see Mansfield pull off a season like that with triple its annual snowfall average. It’s hard to say what’s going to happen with that second potential storm in the modeling, since it’s still pretty far out there, but whether something like that affects the area or not, those backside snows are still in the game… or maybe the equivalent. The latest run of the GFS doesn’t have much of a second storm affecting this area, but there’s plenty of snow on there. Check out that bread and butter (I guess northern stream?) potential behind it. If you put a clown map to it that would be feet of snow for the local mountains by mid-month. That sounds like a lot, but actually, it’s probably just average. I’m sure PF has the numbers, but if we average 3+ feet here at our site, Mansfield should probably be averaging something like 6 feet for the month of December anyway.

Nice! I see that Will commented on the potential for upslope with these next couple of systems. If you’re interested in snow, that’s always something to look forward to, even if you have a system that takes a track leaving the area in the warm sector for much of the storm. Every storm has to pass by eventually and get to the back side, usually with colder air.

We’re on the threshold of December now, so for your location in NH, you can toss the worry out the window and let folks farther south deal with it. Just sit back and enjoy the winter ride that the NNE mountains are going to give you. As I mentioned, from this point on you’re going to be in the game for snow/frozen from essentially any system that touches your area – it doesn’t matter if it goes to the north, south, east, or west of you, or right over your head; there’s almost always going to be some frozen from it unless the upslope is totally wonky/anemic in your area for some reason. Take this next system that everyone spends their time bemoaning; just about every model shows snow up here as it departs. And then the potential one after that, whatever the front end does, the models show it leaving snow in its wake. And if a storm doesn’t work out perfectly, it’s no big deal, there’s typically going to be another snow event right behind it within a few days. You are definitely not in a spot now where you’re going to have to obsess over the models about missing the one or two big shots you might get during the season for snow. You’re literally going to have dozens and dozens of snow chances on the season. With the insane snow numbers coming out of that local Randolph CoCoRaHS site, it’s just hard to imagine it going any other way unless the effects there are somehow very localized. Think about last season – that site recorded more snowfall than I have ever recorded at this site in 14+ years of detailed observations. And, according to the SNE discussions I’ve been seeing, last season was apparently horrible, with the dreaded “pig” pattern most of the season? Imagine what’s going to happen up there in an “average”, or “good” season. LOL!

Checking the base webcam at Bolton Valley at ~2,100’, it was definitely pounding all snow with those more intense echoes. This system (BTV NWS says a weak surface cold front with upper level trough) has always shown a mix of precipitation types on the models, so it looks like it’s playing out as expected. Our forecast down here in the valley is generally rain during the day, but snow works its way into the forecast as we head into the evening and the temperatures come down, so I guess we’ll see how far the snow levels drop as we progress through this storm.

Yeah, we’re getting frozen even down here at 500’, and I popped on to the thread because we just had our first transient accumulation from this event. Not surprisingly, we start to accumulate when the precipitation is most intense, like with that batch that’s pushing through now:

In terms of the bleak weather, this is still very much a typical November routine, even if it feels like things are heading backwards after having snow and colder temperatures. That’s how average Novembers go though, even up here in the northern mountains. There are going to be rounds of snow and then rain again unless you’re in one of those Novembers where things just happen to lock in with consistent below average temperatures. I’m not sure on the exact percentages, but I’d say the cold locking on from some point in the month onward is probably somewhere in the top third to half of Novembers around here. But PF can tell you, a few days of warm temperatures is not really going to take out whatever manmade snow Stowe put down. That stuff is glacier dense, and unless they made the absolute minimum required to squeak by with an opening, it’s not going anywhere. They’ll naturally turn the guns again as soon as temperatures come back down and bolster any spots that need it. For December, getting consistent cold to start at some point in the month is much more typical. December of course can see-saw like November, but it’s much less common and I’d say if you’ve got big temperature see-saw action in December, you’re talking about a month that is definitely in the bottom half of Decembers for ski weather quality. That doesn’t mean you can’t have the rogue storm with rain in a typical December, but constant back and forth with lots of freeze-thaw is definitely in the “below” average category for quality. I’m with Will on skiing early season, at least with respect to the option of riding ribbons of manmade snow. I’m always happy to head out for early days if Mother Nature has put down enough to make skiing away from the ribbons viable, but between the bad snow that’s gone through freeze-thaw cycles, the danger of too many people packed onto too little terrain, and the snow guns potentially even blasting while you’re out there, it’s just not typically a great experience. The warm days (preferably minus any rain) in these cycles are actually where I’d ski if I was going to. The snow softens up, and it can be quite nice, just like spring. This time of year, everyone is chomping at the bit to get going, and it’s often those fast, hard-charging folks that are out there early (especially at Stowe), so you’re not too likely to get much peace and solitude at the start of the day. If I was to go, I’d probably pop up for the last hour or two of the day when most folks are done – you can definitely get some space on the trails once people have packed it in for the day, and on spring snow days, end-of-the-day conditions aren’t really as much of a factor as they are on winter groomer or powder days.

Yeah, definitely another white Thanksgiving for the books. Looking at the numbers, this one sets the occurrence at 10 out of 15 seasons, so the current average is 2/3 of the time (66.7%). In terms of percentage, it’s not much of shift from where it was (64.3%), so somewhere in the 60-70% range is probably a decent estimate.

Event totals: 1.9” Snow/0.15” L.E. We picked up an additional 0.2” of snow with today’s activity. The models don’t really show any backside snow with this system, so what we’ve had thus far could be it for the snow with this event. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.2 inches New Liquid: Trace Temperature: 33.6 F Sky: Cloudy Snow at the stake: 4.0 inches I haven’t cored the snowpack, but it’s probably only got about a third of an inch of liquid in it. Still, I don’t think it’s all just going to disappear overnight based our forecast of temperatures just a bit above freezing, so another white Thanksgiving seems likely.

Since this morning’s snow, it’s really been just cloudy here with the occasional flurry. About an hour ago though we began to get more consistent snowfall, and we’re getting consistent light snow now with big flakes. Presumably the atmosphere has been moistening up with this recent pulse that came into the area to get these flakes all the way down to the valley.

The low variance is why we LOL a bit when we see any sort of seasonal forecasts calling for 150% of average snowfall around here. Heck, even 125% of average snowfall can be hard to achieve. For the local mountain locations, 125% of average snowfall means you’re in the range of 400 inches of snow. That doesn’t happen very often, and indeed if one of the Northern Greens resorts get a 400” season, it’s a solid season. The flip side on that variance is the safety net aspect though; it’s also hard to get really poor snowfall seasons. For those weenie types that are into snow and snowstorms for the emotional roller coaster that comes with the highs and lows, boom and bust of a large variance snow climate, or just want a thrill from tracking storms in the models and don’t really care about the actual utility of the snow, this isn’t necessarily the best climate. If you just want a lot of snow and don’t really want to worry about it too much, this is great climate. As a scientist who’s interested in rigorously documenting the unique snow microclimate here, and as a skier looking for powder and overall quality natural snow conditions for skiing, I personally find this area great. If you’d rather have the occasional blockbuster/blizzard type setup that dumps a bunch of snow, then you can clean it up and be done with it and move on, this isn’t going to be the place. Yeah we get plenty of decent synoptic storms, but if 100 days of snow globe flakes a season, and lots of cloudier days on top of that, feels like more of a nuisance, this climate might feel frustrating.

That title would probably be heavily contended with Tamarack around? What’s the consensus on that?

Event totals: 1.7” Snow/0.15” L.E. Clearing the snowboards this morning was a welcomed change of pace, in that I could simply tilt them and the snow slid right off. It was clear that the temperatures with this event were cold right from the start of the snowfall. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.7 inches New Liquid: 0.15 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 11.3 Snow Density: 8.8% H2O Temperature: 24.4 F Sky: Snow (1-3 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 4.0 inches

Event totals: 3.4” Snow/1.05” L.E. We picked up a final 0.1” of snow after today’s noontime analyses, but it looks like the snow is done now, so the numbers above will be the totals for this system. The next potential chance for snow appears to be with the front end of the system working into the area tomorrow.

You’re right, as I noted in my response above, this is definitely on the early side for the snowpack to start in the typical elevations where people live. The average snowpack start date here at our site is December 2nd, and we’re probably on the early side relative to many valley locations due to early upslope snows helping to get at least some snow down. As noted, we are above 50% (64.3%) for snow on the ground at Thanksgiving, but not all of that Thanksgiving snow necessarily stuck around to start the winter snowpack. Here are the winter snowpack start dates and stats for my period of record at this site: 20-Dec-2006 20-Nov-2007 18-Nov-2008 06-Dec-2009 05-Dec-2010 23-Dec-2011 16-Dec-2012 22-Nov-2013 27-Nov-2014 27-Dec-2015 03-Dec-2016 10-Dec-2017 10-Nov-2018 08-Nov-2019 Mean: Dec 2 Median: Dec 4 S.D. 16 days