J.Spin

These past couple of Novembers have definitely had early snowpack starts here in the valley – in 2018 it was on November 10th, and last year in 2019 it was even earlier, November 8th. It’s funny to think of that with the current weather. Our mean/median snowpack start here is right at the beginning of December. So roughly half the time, the snowpack starts in November, but typically not as early as these past couple of years. The data say that these past couple of seasons are around the -1.5 σ mark, putting them in the earliest 10% of seasons for the start of the continuous winter snowpack.

I was initially puzzled by the statement as well, so I’m glad Ginx threw up the question mark to get clarification. The models show snow chances starting up again as of Friday night, and even up here in the mountains you can’t really pull that off in mid November with substantial warmth.

October Totals Accumulating Storms: 2 Snowfall: 0.7” Liquid Equivalent: 4.92” (-0.40”) Calendar Year Liquid: 42.13” (-2.61”) I hadn’t yet assembled my October precipitation data, but I’ve put it together now and pasted it above. It really was a pretty typical October based on what I’ve observed at this stie. Snowfall was a couple tenths low, but pretty darned close considering the potential variability in the month’s snow. Liquid was a few tenths low, and calendar year liquid is running 2-3” behind average pace.

I haven’t been up to the mountains since Tuesday, but I can pass along some valley snow observations from the past few days from my trips to Burlington. Heading westward into the Champlain Valley on Wednesday, snow disappeared around the Richmond area, then by Thursday the last signs were around the town of Bolton. Yesterday afternoon on the way home, I didn’t see anything in Bolton Flats, and snow didn’t show up until I got near our area near the pass on I-89. There were still a few patches around here at the house this morning, but I suspect this will be the last day to report anything from our location. This weather is really nice now – things are drying out and I should be able to finish lawn cleanup, and the local trails seem to have generally dried up as well, so it could be a good time for a ride. Next weekend doesn’t look nearly this nice though; the models suggest temperatures more typical of November around here with chances for snow if any systems affect the area.

You’re probably right, but in reality, SNE should have shown some discipline and just skipped that October snowstorm. Or, even if they allowed it to happen, they could have at least ignored it and not made a big thread about it. This storm wasn’t nearly as big as that last one, so maybe this winter won’t be quite as bad as that one, but it doesn’t look good. There’s a reason everyone brings up that big negative correlation between October snow and seasonal snowfall in SNE.

I finally had a chance to put together some images from our past couple of storms down here in the valley and up at the mountain, so I’ve added those below. In terms of Tuesday’s ski conditions up at Bolton, it was certainly a fairly typical early season affair, and I’d say waiting for that second storm to put down the extra snow was the way to go. I already posted the settled snow depth profile from my Bolton observations on Tuesday, but I opted to tour up at the main base, and there were clearly at least a couple more inches of settled depth up there (~2,000’) vs. what I found at the Timberline Base (~1,500’). I could tell from the get go as I was ascending the Lower turnpike skin track and watching other skiers descend there, that the density of the snow was going to call for more moderate angle terrain vs. low angle terrain. The snow was fairly medium weight powder, which was of course good with respect to providing some base for skiing. There was obviously no existing snowpack below these storms, so if these recent snow had been 2-4% H2O champagne, there would have been a lot of dicey contact with the ground. But, this medium weight snow was dense enough that there was just too much resistance for low angle terrain – skiers and riders had to straight line their way down and/or use old tracks to keep moving on those angles. Something in the medium to low-angle range was required for solid turns, and that meant that it was a balancing act between choosing terrain that had enough pitch for turns, but not too much pitch that you were going to be outskiing the available snow depth. There was also the factor of finding relatively protected terrain – that first storm especially, had some ridiculous winds, and scouring of the exposed slopes was rampant. So, good knowledge of the local terrain was important, but once you found the appropriate setup there were some nice midwinter powder turns to be had. There was as always that exercise of not going too steep, aggressive, or rocky to outperform the available snow, so of course having knowledge of those grassier options was important in providing the best ski experience.

Thanks for posting the summary map PF. It certainly wasn’t a massive storm series for the mountains relative to what can happen around here, but it was a much more solid shot of snow for the valleys vs. those more typical events during this part of the season that have larger snowfall disparities with respect to elevation. I’ve recorded these past two storms separately because there was a clear enough break between them to do so, but it was a combined 12.4” total of. You actually did say on Monday that this area could pick up a foot of snow, and I assumed that was for the combined storm series, so that was a nice call. As I’d mentioned in an earlier post here in the NNE thread, November seems to be a tough month to get large snowstorms in the valley, and I had the list of November storms ≥4” that I’ve recorded here at our site in another post. Even combined, these recent events would have been our third largest November storm, so it certainly wasn’t record breaking or anything like that. What is very notable though is the early date for these past couple of storms. Being in the first couple days of the month is sort of just chance (vs. being a day or two earlier and being at the end of October), but that’s the way they played out. So, these two storms are obviously going to make their mark in my November records just by the fact that they are the largest storms we’ve had this early in the month. I hadn’t checked on the Burlington area during the event, but when I drove there yesterday, the disparity was obvious because any signs of snow had disappeared by Richmond. You can see on the map that snowfall was basically an order of magnitude higher out here along the eastern slopes, and total liquid was somewhat similar as well. That snow footprint is certainly how someone would write it up if they wanted to deliver in the Sugarbush to Stowe stretch of the Greens.

Event totals: 5.3” Snow/0.33” L.E. It looks like this second storm has finally wound down and we’ve gone to partly cloudy skies, so the totals above should represent the final numbers for the event. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.2 inches New Liquid: Trace Temperature: 34.3 F Sky: Partly Cloudy Snow at the stake: 7.5 inches

It’s great to have the new mapping options from CoCoRaHS now for plotting data from multi-day periods – plotting for these past couple of events, you can definitely see those east slope total liquid numbers and the massive increase from the Burlington area just 20 miles to the west,

These days with the northwest flow banding are great when it’s snow globe flakes for a while, then the sun pops out for a couple of minutes, then you get right under the center of a band and it’s huge flakes with whiteout conditions, then it’s back to snow globe with some sun, etc. We were in Montpelier when that larger cell on the radar came through and it was a whiteout with big 1” diameter flakes for a while. It’s definitely great to be getting back into that northwest flow routine.

Event totals: 5.1” Snow/0.33” L.E. Details from the 12:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.7 inches New Liquid: 0.06 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 11.7 Snow Density: 8.6% H2O Temperature: 34.3 F Sky: Flurries Snow at the stake: 8.5 inches

Yeah, we’re getting some nice rounds of extra snow showers as well down here. You can see the streamers pushing through in line with what Phin had mentioned in one of his posts:

Regarding these past couple of storms, here’s the settled snow depth profile I observed during this morning’s ski tour at Bolton Valley: 340’: 4” 1,000’: 4-6” 1,500’: 6-8” 2,000’: 8-10” 2,500’: 10-12” 3,000’: 12”+

You’re definitely not the only one that likes the heated walkways – I love them. It’s hard to figure out people’s beef. It’s not as if they’re melting the useful snowpack - they’re removing the snow from where you’re going to remove it anyway. You don’t need salt, you’re not scraping down the masonry, and the end result is a clean look instead half scraped areas, and patches of snow and ice everywhere. The effect the heated walkways produce is actually quite aesthetic because you also get the clean edges between where the snow should be and where it shouldn’t, instead of piles of shoveled snow thrown everywhere. Shoveled piles can have a clean look sometimes as well, but there’s often some sort of dirt or salt in there, and it’s hard to beat the clean lines of the heated walkways where the surrounding snow is typically pristine/untouched.

Event totals: 4.4” Snow/0.27” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.3 inches New Liquid: 0.10 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 13.0 Snow Density: 7.7% H2O Temperature: 29.8 F Sky: Light Snow (2-12 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 9.0 inches

Event totals: 3.1” Snow/0.17” L.E. Details from the 12:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 3.1 inches New Liquid: 0.17 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 18.2 Snow Density: 5.5% H2O Temperature: 29.3 F Sky: Snow (2-8 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 8.0 inches

I’m starting to see a few flakes falling again, so this may be the approach of that next system.

Event totals: 7.1” Snow/0.70” L.E. We picked up an additional 0.3” of accumulation today before the snowfall finally wound down. I was unsure if these two systems would blend together enough to be considered one event, but the substantial break we’ve had clearly indicates that the upcoming Clipper/upper-level shortwave is its own discrete storm. So, the totals above will represent the final numbers for today’s event. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.3 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 30.0 Snow Density: 3.3% H2O Temperature: 28.6 F Sky: Cloudy Snow at the stake: 6.0 inches

The updated BTV NWS maps for this event are below. As was noted, there are now some WWA over in NNH. On the projected accumulations map, the numbers are up just a bit in the valleys, but some areas of 12-18” shading are appearing near the peaks.

We’re definitely in that interlude period with shortwave ridging as the BTV NWS forecast discussion notes: Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Burlington VT 923 AM EST Mon Nov 2 2020 .NEAR TERM /THROUGH TUESDAY/... Snow showers will briefly wane this afternoon as shortwave ridging aloft briefly traverses the North Country. However, a reinvigorated shot of snow showers is expected late tonight through Tuesday morning with the passage of a shortwave trough and its surface reflection. I’ve been watching to see if I’ll need to split this event apart into two storms, but thus far we’ve had the usual continuation of some flakes in the air with peeks of sun. We’ll see if we fully clear out, but we just had another small pulse of moisture push through:

Upslope snow is for skiing… and scenery. Actually, as long as there’s some base, it’s great for lots of stuff like sledding, snowshoeing, snow angels, snowmobiling, etc., etc. You can eventually use it for structural stuff, but you have to wait for it to warm up a bit.

Event totals: 6.8” Snow/0.69” L.E. Snowfall has been running generally in the ~1 in/hr. range through the morning here at our site, with 5.7” of new snow since the clearing of the boards at last observations time. Details from the 12:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 5.7 inches New Liquid: 0.37 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 15.4 Snow Density: 6.5% H2O Temperature: 30.7 F Sky: Light Snow (2-12 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 7.0 inches

Yeah, I’d say the snowfall rate is in the 1”/hr. range. I wasn’t up then, but my wife said snow started up around 5:10 A.M., and as of 9:00 A.M. we’d picked up 4 inches, so that’s right in line with that average rate. Total accumulation was between 5 and 6 inches last time I checked.

I’ve got the updated event maps from the BTV NWS below. They’ve definitely expanded the initial Winter Weather Advisories eastward and southward somewhat, and that lake effect snow warning has been added off to the west. The projected accumulations map is fairly similar to what was put out yesterday, with what seems like a bit of a bump in the accumulations for the lower elevations. Our point forecast here got a nudge upward for tonight with 3” to 5”, but it’s still in that general 5” to 10” range overall.

Yeah, here’s the composite radar – it has that classic look from the WNW with those pulses of 30+ db moisture, so that’s a good sign.