J.Spin

Event totals: 3.9” Snow/0.31” L.E. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.3 inches New Liquid: Trace Temperature: 20.7 F Sky: Flurries Snow at the stake: 6.0 inches The snowfall had tapered off quite a bit and it looked like this would be the last round of accumulation for this event, but it’s picked back up this evening so there will be at least a bit more to report.

Event totals: 3.6” Snow/0.31” L.E. Details from the 12:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.1 inches New Liquid: 0.04 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 27.5 Snow Density: 3.6% H2O Temperature: 28.2 F Sky: Flurries Snow at the stake: 6.0 inches

Indeed it’s often real, and perfectly normal, but as Alex said, the 60+ made this round of trolling a bit over the top.

Yeah, I’ve noticed that as well; it’s like some sort of defense mechanism for when potential warmth is on the horizon or something like that. The “Rains to Maines” thing appears to be in the same vein. OK, so CT’s winter climate isn’t that great, but constantly trying to schadenfreude the rest of the region into it at this point, when they all know the shtick (Alex, now you know) is pretty much like hanging a “Desperate” sign around one’s neck.

Yeah, there’s some nice efficient production of flakes and you can really see it banking up against the spine: We’ve had about another inch or so here at the house, and it’s stacking up nicely with minimal wind, so I’m sure the next analysis will come in with a pretty high snow to water ratio. Wind was picking up in more exposed areas when we were in town though, and the Vista Quad is currently on wind hold up at Bolton Valley.

Event totals: 2.5” Snow/0.27” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.6 inches New Liquid: 0.03 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 20.0 Snow Density: 5.0% H2O Temperature: 26.4 F Sky: Light Snow (1 to 8 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 5.0 inches

Event totals: 1.9” Snow/0.24” L.E. Details from the 10:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.9 inches New Liquid: 0.07 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 12.9 Snow Density: 7.8% H2O Temperature: 30.6 F Sky: Light Snow (1 to 4 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 5.0 inches

Event totals: 1.0” Snow/0.17” L.E. Details from the 4:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.0 inches New Liquid: 0.17 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 5.9 Snow Density: 17.0% H2O Temperature: 33.3 F Sky: Light Snow (3 to 20 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 4.5 inches

Snow started up here in the Waterbury area around 10:00 A.M. – it’s still fairly light at this point, but I’m seeing some of those larger flakes you mentioned and we’re starting to get a bit of accumulation down here at 500’.

I’m not sure why I even looked, but yeah, you can’t help but love the sentiment in the “main storm thread” as Winter Weather Advisories go into effect.

We’ve got a Winter Weather Advisory posted now for incoming Winter Storm Henry. Our point forecast here suggests 3-8” through Sunday with some additional potential accumulations Sunday night into Monday.

With the improvement in conditions thanks to these past couple of storms, we hit the mountain for a bit of skiing around New Year’s, so I’ll pass along some Bolton Valley conditions and pics. The additional snow that came on the 1st is when the resort really starting opening up natural snow terrain. On Tuesday, snowpack in mid to upper elevations offered about 4 inches of powder atop a thicker layer/crust, and then there was another roughly 4 inches of dense snow below that, and then you got to the base snow. By Wednesday that topmost layer of powder was generally 6 inches plus, so the powder skiing off piste was definitely improving. There’s still not enough snow to open more than moderately-pitched natural snow terrain, but another storm or two without any major warm storms will obviously get terrain expansion going. There is a decent amount of natural snow terrain that’s set for powder skiing and should be great with additional accumulations:

Yeah, we are actually behind on seasonal snowfall at our site as I mentioned above. Mean is ~55” and we’re at ~50”, so of course we’re well within 1 S.D. of the mean and not behind the eight ball, but a shot of snow would at least help keep pace with average. And LOL at the thread for this potential storm – of course now it’s a POS storm. I still find it really weird how people “track” the storm through the model runs and somehow project the feeling that the end result is “changing” as the output from the models changes. Using terms like “losing the storm”, or “it’s gone” really perpetuates this. The reality is that the end result was always going to be what it ends up being – the model runs were simply suggesting something that wasn’t ever going to occur. If model runs show nothing and then a modest event pops up out of nowhere, the weenies are positive as if it’s some sort of “win”, but if there are model runs showing a potential larger event that ends up smaller, or as nothing, then it’s doom and gloom and whatever effects ensue due to the nonsense they built up in their heads.

December Totals Accumulating Storms: 11 Snowfall: 30.0” Liquid Equivalent: 3.02” 2019 Precipitation: 61.49” December snowfall came in right at 30.0 inches, which is definitely lean with average being closer to 40 inches. Thanks to these last couple of storms at the end of the month though, snowfall did end up better than the 25.1 inches from last season. December can be a very impressive snow month here with moisture of the lakes still in play, and that potential January arctic cold and storm suppression not typically in the picture yet. But with this December in the books now, it’s been a surprisingly long time since we’ve had a strong one with respect to snowfall – looking at my data it’s been since the 2012-2013 season, which had 49.5 inches of snow. The 11 accumulation storms this month was right about average, but total liquid equivalent was a couple inches on the lean side, and snowpack was well below average, so it’s really going to go down as a pretty lackluster month. I haven’t summed SDD for the snowpack, but I’m sure it’s quite low. Although we’ve maintained snow since the pack began back on November 8th, it’s limped along at just an inch or two during the middle of the month. Mean snowpack right now is close to a foot, so we’re still several inches below that, and it’s only been the past week that’s it’s really started to increase again. November was a bit above average on snowfall, but with December being slow, it’s not surprising that we’re a little behind average pace on the season. Mean snowfall to this point is ~55” and we’re at ~50”, so it’s lagging a little, but it’s not really a huge deficit at this point.

Nobody loves hard data more than me, so I think it’s awesome when people post these to speak to the “model X is better than model Y” weenie-ness. However, there are at least a couple of points that people never really seem to drive home sufficiently for me: 1) How does model performance with respect to 500 hPa correlation (which I’m assuming is analyzed globally for the 20° – 80° N region in these data sets?) actually relate to the model’s effectiveness as a guidance tool for sensible weather at the surface? Beyond that of course, how much utility is there in that analysis for the model’s region-specific performance for a certain part of the globe? 2) So you’ve already got the above factors in play, and then, how are you going to convince me that a couple of hundredths of a difference in correlation coefficient is even relevant? The trend in model difference (and actually a bit of correlation improvement) is clear over the course of those years, and with so much data, the stats may be there to support a statistical difference between the anomaly correlation of the two models. Regardless of that outcome though, it still doesn’t speak to the relevance of a 0.03 difference in correlation coefficient to the actual utility of the models. Again, I love when people post these types of data, but I’d like to hear more about whether or not they actually speak to a realistic difference in model performance that matters to forecasting.

I’ve seen various people on the boards get confused on this, and it’s because there’s not necessarily any correlation between a system’s resolution (what’s the smallest level of detail that can be discerned), accuracy (how close are you to reality/expected value) and precision/variability (reproducibility). I don’t follow the specifics of weather modeling, but from what I’ve seen (and this can be the case in other systems as well) there’s typically an inverse correlation between resolution and variability. Some types of output from the ensembles are sort of an example of this with smoothing/low resolution. Low resolution output will likely be less susceptible to variability in some cases because you’re not even going to see changes below a certain threshold.

Event totals: 3.1” Snow/0.21” L.E. Details from the 9:00 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: 31.8 F Sky: Flurries Snow at the stake: 6.0 inches

I’m surprised nobody brought up borderwx in terms of northerly location; his latitude has got to be close to 45° North. There’s also someone in the Plattsburg area now who indicated he was pretty far north, and don’t we have someone in St. Albans as well? We’re at 44.36° North here in Waterbury.

Event totals: 2.3” Snow/0.16” L.E. Details from the 3:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.9 inches New Liquid: 0.07 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 12.9 Snow Density: 7.8% H2O Temperature: 32.5 F Sky: Light Snow (2 to 4 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 5.5 inches

Event totals: 1.4” Snow/0.09” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.3 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 30.0 Snow Density: 3.3% H2O Temperature: 30.0 F Sky: Cloudy Snow at the stake: 5.0 inches

Event totals: 1.1” Snow/0.08” L.E. Details from the 12:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.1 inches New Liquid: 0.08 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 13.8 Snow Density: 7.3% H2O Temperature: 31.5 F Sky: Light Snow (1 to 7 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 5.0 inches

Event totals: 5.2” Snow/0.85” L.E. We had light snow/flurries much of the day today, but temperatures also crept above freezing here in the valley, so accumulation was slow. The above totals should be the final numbers for Winter Storm Gage, and anything we get tonight I’ll roll into the next system that is currently moving in from the west. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.1 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 10.0 Snow Density: 10.0% H2O Temperature: 31.6 F Sky: Cloudy Snow at the stake: 4.0 inches

Event totals: 5.1” Snow/0.84” L.E. Details from the 12:00 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: 35.2 F Sky: Light Snow (2 to 10 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 4.0 inches

Event totals: 4.6” Snow/0.82” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.3 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 30.0 Snow Density: 3.3% H2O Temperature: 30.2 F Sky: Light Snow (2 to 8 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 3.5 inches

Event totals: 4.3” Snow/0.81” L.E. Details from the 12:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.7 inches New Liquid: 0.06 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 11.7 Snow Density: 8.6% H2O Temperature: 30.2 F Sky: Flurries Snow at the stake: 3.5 inches