J.Spin

Event totals: 1.3” Snow/1.54” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.6 inches New Liquid: 0.07 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 8.6 Snow Density: 11.7% H2O Temperature: 31.1 F Sky: Cloudy Snow at the stake: 0.5 inches

Event totals: 0.7” Snow/1.47” L.E. The snow is beginning to accumulate again here in the valley now that evening has set in and temperatures have come back down. Details from the 12:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.5 inches New Liquid: 0.11 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 4.5 Snow Density: 22.0% H2O Temperature: 33.4 F Sky: Snow (5 to 20 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 0.5 inches

I popped up to the mountain for a tour this afternoon, so here’s the snow accumulation profile starting from the bottom of the Bolton Valley Access Road: 340’: 0” 900’: T 1,000’: ½-1” 1,500’: 2” 2,000’: 4-5” 2,500’: 7” 3,000’: 8-9” I put the 900’ measurement in there because that’s right where you could see the first accumulations, and they quickly jumped up by the time you hit the Bolton Valley Welcome Sign at ~1,000’. The snow wasn’t really wet at all (at least where I was touring in the 2,000’+ range). It was reasonably dense and offered plenty of bottomless turns, but certainly not unlimited bottomless turns on all the steepest pitches. We’ve had roughly 1.25” of liquid equivalent from this event down here at the house, so there’s certainly a decent amount of L.E. in that snow at elevation. It was interesting up on the mountain today because a bit of sunshine appeared near the start of the tour, but by the time I was finishing up it was pounding heavy snow composed of big flakes. It was in the 20s F and snowing so hard in the Village at that point that it felt like it had to be accumulating down in the valley, but it was an impressive gradient as I headed back down the mountain and the snow still wasn’t really accumulating much below the 1,000’ level.

Checking on the Bolton Valley live webcams I’d say there’s an inch or two at 2,100’. The temperatures have definitely helped so far today up there relative to yesterday. For yesterday’s snow you could see the accumulations down at the main base kind of accumulate and melt back to expose areas of old snow, but most of those grungy areas of snow are pretty well covered up at base elevation right now. Via the Vista Peak cam, it looks like there have been at least a few inches of snow up there at 3,150’, but it’s hard to say with the wind (I actually just saw a skier head down Alta Vista, but couldn’t tell too much from their turns). If I head up I’ll certainly pass along a report, as it’s definitely snowing and accumulating up there right now.

We’ve had light snow pretty continuously all morning, but we’ve only had 0.2” of accumulation through noon here, so just a coating on some surfaces. I don’t think we’ll accumulate much during the day down here at our elevation base on what I’m seeing out there now. If the moisture is still going I could imagine some additional accumulation as temperatures come down tonight.

Yeah, we hadn’t really seen any snow with this system yet down here at 500’ in the Winooski Valley, but we did start getting some flakes and accumulation this morning at some point in the 8:00 A.M. to 8:30 A.M. range.

I see on Bolton’s webcams that the precipitation is all snow up at Vista Peak at 3,150’ and even down at 2,100’ at the main base. Since this is expected to be the warmer part or the storm, that’s a good sign with respect to getting some decent accumulations out of this event to support turns. I haven’t seen any flakes down here at 500’ yet, but we’re still fairly warm in the valley.

Yeah, I saw that winter alerts had gone up in the latest updates. Our point forecast here calls for something in the 3-6” range, which seems to jive with what they’ve got in the projected accumulations map. If we’ve got the potential for accumulations down at 500’, then you know the mountains have the potential to do well, as the latest Mansfield point forecast would suggest: Thursday Snow showers, mainly before noon, then snow after noon. High near 36. Very windy, with a south wind 25 to 35 mph increasing to 40 to 50 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New snow accumulation of 4 to 8 inches possible. Thursday Night Snow likely. Cloudy, with a low around 21. Wind chill values as low as -1. Very windy, with a west wind 45 to 49 mph. Chance of precipitation is 70%. New snow accumulation of 3 to 7 inches possible. Friday Snow. High near 25. Wind chill values as low as zero. Windy, with a northwest wind 30 to 34 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New snow accumulation of 3 to 7 inches possible. Friday Night Snow showers likely, mainly before 9pm. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 17. Windy, with a northwest wind 26 to 33 mph. Chance of precipitation is 60%. New snow accumulation of 1 to 3 inches possible. Saturday A 30 percent chance of snow showers before 2pm. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 31. Blustery, with a northwest wind 20 to 25 mph. The latest BTV NWS alerts and accumulations maps are below, with some of that 12-18” shading along the spine in the Bolton-Mansfield stretch:

The BTV NWS has a headline going for the event on their home page, and I’ve pasted their most recent projected accumulations map below. The shading in the current iteration of the map suggests a general 8-12” along the spine for the Northern Greens, and it looks like it’s just getting into that 12-18” shading up near Jay Peak.

It’s definitely becoming potent in some of the modeling, and the BTV NWS is starting to talk about it in their discussions: Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Burlington VT 1030 AM EDT Wed Apr 8 2020 .SHORT TERM /THURSDAY NIGHT THROUGH FRIDAY/... ...setup is looking increasingly favorable for some snow accumulations in higher terrain as upper- level low stall and pivots over the forecast area. Storm total snow through Friday will be in the 2 to 5 inch range for much of the Northeast Kingdom and portions of the northern Adirondacks. Higher peaks (generally 1500 ft and above) of the NEK and northern Greens have the potential for 6+ inches. Winter Weather Advisories may be needed for portions of northern Vermont, but given that the heavier accumulations will be restricted to 1500 ft and above, have elected to hold off any headlines at this point.

When I checked yesterday at observations time, the last of the snow had disappeared in the yard, so April 6th marked the final day of the seasonal snowpack. The numbers here indicate that mean melt out is April 15th, ± 11 days, so this year was early, but within 1 S.D. of the mean. Duration of the continuous snowpack this season ended up being 151 days, which was longer than average because of the early start, but also within 1 S.D. of the mean. Despite being behind average snowfall pace right now by over 20 inches, this season wound up being quite respectable in that snowpack duration category, ranking in 4th place out of the 14 seasons in my records.

March Totals Accumulating Storms: 7 Snowfall: 12.9” Liquid Equivalent: 3.34” March mean and median snowfall here at our site are both right around 30 inches, so this March was definitely somewhat lean in that department, running 0.86 S.D. below average. This March certainly won’t go down as a “middle of the pack” type of month, but it’s definitely not in with the “bottom of the barrel” type seasons like ‘09-‘10 (2.1”) and ’15-‘16 (5.7”) either. It even edged out ‘08-‘09 (12.6”), although it certainly falls in that group with seasons like ’11-‘12 (14.2”) and ’14-‘15 (17.2”). Total liquid for the month was a bit below the mean (3.67”), but pretty typical overall. The total number of accumulating snowstorms was actually right about the average (~7.5). Now that we’re on to April, the yard snowpack is dwindling and I suspect the last vestiges will be gone within a few days. It will likely disappear earlier than average (4/15), but it already looks like it’s going to persist longer than some of the very early seasons like ‘09-‘10 (4/3). This season had a very early snowpack start though (11/8), so the duration of the continuous winter snowpack here in the yard is already at 148 days and beyond the average duration.

Nice, glad to hear you got out into the backcountry. I was actually thinking of touring on the Bolton BC Network when we were out the other day – with so many people off from work, the resort trails are getting more traffic than usual. The snowpack at the Mt. Mansfield Stake is still 60 inches, and the forecast shows various chances for snow in the higher elevations over the next week. Even if none of the snows are very substantial, there don’t seem to be any overly warm temperatures, so the snowpack at elevation shouldn’t be going anywhere. I’m hoping we get some more rounds of spring storms with accumulations like this last one – it’s kind of strange having the resorts closed here in March, but it’s presenting some unique opportunities. The time of year is always so great with the deep snowpack and longer days, and the warm spring skiing is certainly fun, but the spring powder days have such a cool vibe – you get a piece of winter sort of transplanted into spring, atop what is typically the deepest base of the season!

With the fresh powder from Winter Storm Quincy, my younger son and I headed out for a ski tour at Bolton Valley yesterday, so I can pass along some snow updates and images. Depth checks of the new snow at 1,500’, 2,000’, and even up above 3,000’ were all essentially the same in the 7 to 8” range. That’s essentially the same as what we picked up at the house, so overall, there really didn’t seem to be much change in accumulation around here from 500’ on up to above 3,000’. Temperatures stayed well below freezing even at 2,000’, and probably even down to 1,500’, so the turns were very nice. The powder was of medium to perhaps slightly higher density, the snow had a nice surfy consistency, with enough buoyancy for bottomless turns on even steep pitches in the black diamond range. You could certainly hit bottom on the very steepest pitches, but we focused on medium-angle terrain and it was bottomless all the way. With many people not going to work right now as the state strives to minimize the spread of COVID-19, and a fresh dump of powder on the slopes, I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised at how many people were out for turns. The number of people touring seemed notable though – between Timberline and the Village, there were at least several dozen cars out there. Despite the number of people up at the resort, it was clear that even resort ski touring is still a great activity for social distancing. As is typically the case, we actually saw only a few people while we were out on the hill, and you still never had to go within 50 feet of anyone if you didn’t want to. A few shots from the tour:

Event totals: 8.7” Snow/0.70” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.6 inches New Liquid: 0.05 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 12.0 Snow Density: 8.3% H2O Temperature: 31.8 F Sky: Light Snow (1 to 4 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 9.0 inches

Event totals: 8.1” Snow/0.65” L.E. Details from the 12:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 5.8 inches New Liquid: 0.44 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 13.2 Snow Density: 7.6% H2O Temperature: 30.2 F Sky: Light Snow (2 to 12 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 8.5 inches

I got a text alert around 7:30 P.M. that we’ve been put under a Winter Storm Warning here in Washington Country, no doubt due to the continued heavy snowfall. The BTV NWS has updated their maps as well, which I’ve included below. Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Burlington VT 758 PM EDT Mon Mar 23 2020 NEAR TERM /THROUGH TUESDAY NIGHT/... As of 748 PM EDT Monday...Well its been an extremely busy evening here at the office, as we expanded the advisories north to the international border and placed central/southern cwa into winter storm warnings. Expecting storm total of 2 to 6 inches advisory and 4 to 8 inches in warnings, with many reports of 6 inches or so from Newcomb to Port Henry to Orwell to Bridport. A meso- band developed and moved further north than anticipated, causing snowfall rates of 1 to 3 inches per hour. We picked up 2.9 inches in 1 hour here at BTV during this band. Moving forward expect this initial band to lift northeast of our cwa by 02z, however, some additional lighter bands of snow will continue to impact central/southern cwa thru midnight or so. Have updated snowfall maps and qpf to match our thinking.

I saw this band approaching on the radar, and the snowfall rate turned out to be pretty robust as it came through here. I’d cleared the snowboards at 6:00 P.M., and as of 6:30 P.M. there was already an addition 2.6” of accumulation, so the snowfall was in excess of 5”/hr. during that period.

Event totals: 2.3” Snow/0.21” L.E. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 2.3 inches New Liquid: 0.21 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 11.0 Snow Density: 9.1% H2O Temperature: 30.9 F Sky: Snow (2 to 10 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 2.5 inches

I’ve got the latest BTV NWS maps for the current storm, which has been given the name Winter Storm Quincy by TWC. There aren’t really any winter weather alerts this far north in the state, but I have seen some fairly steady snow this afternoon in the Burlington and Waterbury areas. The projected accumulations map has us in the 3-4” range, and the point forecast suggests something in the 2-4” range, so the agreement is fairly good there.

Event totals: 0.2” Snow/0.08” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.2 inches New Liquid: Trace Temperature: 25.2 F Sky: Flurries/Light Snow (2 to 10 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: Trace

Event totals: 1.6” Snow/0.10” L.E. Details from the 4:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.2 inches New Liquid: 0.02 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 10.0 Snow Density: 10.0% H2O Temperature: 42.6 F Sky: Sprinkles/Mist Snow at the stake: 2.5 inches

Event totals: 1.4” Snow/0.08” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.4 inches New Liquid: 0.08 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 17.5 Snow Density: 5.7% H2O Temperature: 30.7 F Sky: Light Snow (2 to 8 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 3.0 inches

Thanks for the great thoughts PF; it indeed sounds decent luck in the valleys with synoptic storms, and a dearth of bread and butter events/cyclonic backside flow is a combination that could explain the interesting valley/mountain snowfall distribution we’ve seen.

As I recall, you’re a touch north of me and PF with respect to latitude, but it still sounds like snowfall is a little more behind average pace over there. From what I’ve seen, the next chances for snow still appear to be the chance for a touch on the back side of this current system, and then that late week one you mentioned. The one later this week definitely has some potential for snow in the elevations at the moment per the BTV NWS forecast discussion: Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Burlington VT 726 AM EDT Tue Mar 10 2020 .LONG TERM /THURSDAY NIGHT THROUGH MONDAY/... While main surface low tracks well north of the region, models indicate the potential for a secondary low to form along the main frontal boundary. Overall, this system looks not too shabby with nose of ~160kt 300mb jet tracking across western NY into New England, upper trough becomes negatively tilted and a fairly strong thermal boundary is apparent at 700mb. The best dynamics 9previously mentioned) arrive toward 18z Friday with a period of heavy rain/(mountain) snow likely ahead of main frontal boundary. 24-hr QPF ending 00z Saturday among main global guidance (GFS, EMCWF, CMC) show between 0.40-0.80" of precipitation falling. The trend on that secondary low development will probably be the thing to watch. If the QPF numbers mentioned above were to come in as mostly snow at elevation, that would hold some potential for some decent turns. It really comes down to how much liquid equivalent falls as snow though – with the base having gone through a thorough thaw/freeze at all elevations at this point, it either has to be warm enough to soften, or there has to be enough liquid equivalent for a semi-decent resurfacing. Everything in between isn’t really worth it aside from race training or going out to ski some firm groomers.