J.Spin

The 9 PM to 10 PM time block delivered roughly an inch and a half of snow here, so the snowfall rate has remained fairly robust this evening. It’s not very obvious to me from the radar or even visual observation of the snowfall here, but I checked when I saw the depth of the stack on the snowboard and it seemed like it had seen a good increase in the past hour.

I just checked, and as of roughly 9 PM there’s another 3.2” on the boards, so 5.1” thus far for the storm. Snowfall has been running right around an inch per hour this evening. The flakes are a bit larger now, and the snow seems a bit less dense so I’d say the ratio would be could be higher in the next analysis, but we’ll have to see what kinds of flakes the rest of the evening brings. Indeed this is great resurfacing snow for the slopes.

Event totals: 1.9” Snow/0.25” L.E. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.9 inches New Liquid: 0.25 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 7.6 Snow Density: 13.2% H2O Temperature: 16.5 F Sky: Snow (1 to 4 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 23.0 inches

Event totals: 1.9” Snow/0.25” L.E. There was perhaps an inch of snow when I was heading out from Burlington through the western slopes toward Waterbury. I was thankful because while it was snowing at a decent clip, there was generally blacktop on I-89 for both lanes, although the areas between the lanes and the edges of the lanes were snow covered. Route 2 was mostly snow covered though, and once I got home the snow accumulations seemed a bit more robust with a couple of inches down. Flakes have been fairly small, and the snow is definitely dense, coming in at 13.2% H2O for this first part of the storm with a quarter inch of liquid in just the two inches. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.9 inches New Liquid: 0.25 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 7.6 Snow Density: 13.2% H2O Temperature: 16.5 F Sky: Snow (1 to 4 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 23.0 inches

Well, these should be the last forecast updates for upcoming Winter Storm Maya. The BTV NWS advisory map is now Winter Storm Warnings across the board, and projected accumulations look to be about 4-12” depending on shadowing. Projected accumulations in our point forecast sum to 6-14” through Wednesday night, which seems pretty in synch with the map.

The updated advisory and projected accumulations maps from the BTV NWS below. There really aren’t any major changes, but Winter Storm Warnings now cover all of the area aside from the southern half of New Hampshire. The projected accumulations map seems to have had just some tweaks here and there. Our point forecast indicates accumulations of 8-16” through Wednesday as it did earlier today.

Thanks for adding the text update. I think those areas of 12-18” along the spine in the projected accumulations map are a bit out of synch with the text above, but perhaps those are just for the higher elevations. They do have some of that shading scattered elsewhere around VT too. I guess some of the algorithms are tipping things into that next tier in various spots.

I’ve got the latest advisory and projected accumulations maps from the BTV NWS below. On the advisories map, there’s been an expansion of Winter Storm Warnings off into most of Upstate New York, and New Hampshire is still under Winter Storm Watches off to the east. The projected accumulations map looks to be the same one that mreaves posted earlier, with some areas in the 12-18” range along the spine, and the anticipated shadowing of the western slopes. Our current point forecast suggests accumulations of 8-16” through Wednesday, with a bit more possible Wednesday night. That might be a bit on the high side compared to the map, but our site is right among the 8-12”/12-18” zones, and we’ll see how projections get tweaked with the next update.

Here’s the latest projected accumulations map for Winter Storm Maya from the BTV NWS:

Winter Storm Warnings are now up for all of the BTV NWS forecast area:

Things really seemed to escalate quickly overnight with respect to Winter Storm Maya. The first signs were early this morning when I was watching The Weather Channel and saw projected accumulations of 12”+ in NNE. Then I stopped in at the BTV NWS homepage and saw that Winter Storm Watches were already posted. Presumably they’ve got a decent amount of confidence that we’re going to see some impacts. The latest advisory and projected accumulations maps are below:

Event totals: 0.1” Snow/0.03” L.E. We had spits of snow at various times last night, but even down here there were some winds that kept it from accumulating very well. Eventually we did hit a tenth of an inch of accumulation though to add to the event. It was a bit tough parsing out the precipitation from Winter Storm Lucian this week due to the way it split into that predecessor impulse as it got into our part of the country. Initially I had it as one large system from the 6th through the 9th, but after incorporating the information from the BTV NWS forecast discussions, and witnessing the Thursday lull, they were split into that predecessor system on the 6th and 7th, with formal Winter Storm Lucian on the 8th. It’s also interesting to note that for our area, the smaller, predecessor system brought the more significant precipitation (0.3” snow/0.51” L.E.), while Winter Storm Lucian itself basically skipped right through this area with the totals at the top of this post (0.1” snow/0.03”) L.E. The Winter Storm Lucian page has now progressed to the recap stage, so the storm’s photo gallery is in place. They’ve got almost 100 photographs collected for this one, with some awesome shots from the big totals out in the Sierra, as well as unique images from the Seattle area getting affected by one of their infrequent snow events. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.1 inches New Liquid: Trace Temperature: 15.8 F Sky: Partly Cloudy Snow at the stake: 21.5 inches

Yeah, RASTA has done some fantastic work there with the Brandon Gap Backcountry Recreation Area – they’ve got a fairly high-elevation, snowy spot, with north-facing terrain, easy road access, ample parking, well-signed trails, dedicated skin tracks, nice maintained glades… the list really goes on and on, and it honestly feels like a model for what people can do with respect to organized backcountry skiing areas. There were probably a dozen vehicles at the Bear Brook Bowl Access Point when we arrived for our Saturday outing, and I didn’t get a chance to check out the license plates at that point, but at the end of our tour we did get to talk to some of the people in the cars near ours. There were two cars right by us that were both from out of state. They were all together, and they were next heading off to dinner right there in Rochester. If that’s not a perfect example of the economic benefits that RASTA’s work is bringing to the area, I don’t know what is. I’ve actually only hit a couple of the lines at this point from the Bear Brook Bowl Access and Trailhead, and there’s still so much more to explore at that area. On top of that, there’s a whole different area with its own access point and additional terrain off to the west. I’ll never forget seeing the stack of snow atop the trail map on my very first trip to the area last March though – as a skier, you see powder sitting up stacked like that without wind and it’s a very good sign.

Event totals: 0.3” Snow/0.45” L.E. The precipitation here at the house this evening has generally been a mixture of sleet and rain from what I’ve seen, but there was definitely some freezing rain back in Burlington when I was leaving there around 5:30 P.M. Details from the 6:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.1 inches (sleet) New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 10.0 Snow Density: 10.0% H2O Temperature: 33.4 F Sky: Sleet/Rain Snow at the stake: 24.5 inches Details from the 12:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.2 inches (sleet) New Liquid: 0.02 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 10.0 Snow Density: 10.0% H2O Temperature: 34.5 F Sky: Light Rain Snow at the stake: 24.5 inches

I’ve seen the CVT/NVT snowpack disparity noted a couple of times here now, but it’s interesting, we really didn’t see it on Saturday when we were down at Brandon Gap (which I would definitely consider right smack there in the CVT zone). It may be because of the high elevation there (base is near 2,000’), or the fact that it’s not getting lift-served levels of traffic to degrade the snow, but the snowpack there seemed really robust.

The NWS has Winter Weather Advisories up across the region ahead of Winter Storm Lucian, which is the next system expected to affect our area. Snow accumulations are expected to be fairly minimal around here, with the advisory most associated with the mixed wintry precipitation that’s anticipated. Advisory and projected snowfall maps from the BTV NWS are below:

We headed to RASTA’s backcountry skiing network at Brandon Gap yesterday, so I can pass along some info and images. Temperatures were very comfortable at around 20 F, and skies were cloudy until about midafternoon when it started to snow in association with yesterday’s system. The network there is generally in the 2,000’ to 3,000’ elevation range or so, and the snowpack is quite prodigious. It’s too deep for me to easily estimate based on any pole measurements, but there really aren’t any deficiencies and everything you could possibly want to be covered certainly is. Surface powder depths we encountered were generally 12 to 24 inches, with the highest reading I obtained at 26 inches. The composition of the subsurface was pretty inconsequential because you just weren’t having to get near it with just backcountry traffic, but from what we could tell didn’t seem overly crusty. Even down there the snowfall was fairly vigorous, definitely up around 3,000’, although I’m sure they didn’t quite pick up the accumulations PF showed along the northern tier. In any event, base depths and surface conditions are excellent.

I just checked, and we had a trace or more of snow on 26 out of 31 days, so ~84% of them. Actually, it just started snowing here while I was writing this – I guess it’s associated with that little impulse coming into the area:

Well, as an interesting follow up to last month’s snowfall data and the strange dichotomy of January snowfall we’ve had in this area, I noticed something when I was entering my monthly numbers. This past January had essentially as much snow (66.5”) as the past three Januarys combined (67.1”). And, the previous three Januarys to those produced pretty much that same result (67.2”). January snowfall had really been running on idle around here for quite a while.

Event totals: 1.7” Snow/0.10” L.E. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.3 inches New Liquid: Trace Temperature: 20.5 F Sky: Cloudy Snow at the stake: 31.0 inches

Event totals: 1.4” Snow/0.10” L.E. Details from the 8:00 P.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 1.4 inches New Liquid: 0.10 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 14.0 Snow Density: 7.1% H2O Temperature: 18.7 F Sky: Light Snow (2 to 8 mm flakes) Snow at the stake: 31.0 inches

January totals: 66.5” Snow/6.22” L.E. This January was notable at our site in that the last time we had one with above average snowfall was eight seasons ago (January 2011 with 55.5”). My data set only covers about a dozen years, but January is still the snowiest month at the climate sites around here. So, unless the monthly distribution in the mountains here varies dramatically from those sites, that stretch was presumably not the norm. As a skier, this January was much closer to how you’d write it up though – lots of moisture, plenty of fresh snow, and none of that sitting under dry, frigid arctic air for a week at a time.

SDD Through January 31st by season: 2007-2008: 863.0 2008-2009: 814.0 2018-2019: 1035.0 This season is ahead of those in terms of SDD, so certainly on the high end.

You know it’s interesting, I wonder if the mountains are doing better than the mountain valleys this season, relatively speaking? We’re well ahead of average on snowfall here at our site, but it’s certainly not unprecedented – we’ve generally been running right along with good snowfall seasons such as 2007-2008 and 2008-2009. Here’s how snowfall through January 31st (conveniently, right around the midpoint of the season) stacks up for the three seasons: 2007-2008: 113.6” 2008-2009: 129.0” 2018-2019: 128.6” I know it looks like 2007-2008 might be lagging at this point, but in a few days it’s going to jump right up to 140”, and it’s going to keep its foot on the gas right past 200”, so it’s definitely a top contender in snowfall seasons. Maybe we’ve just done better at building and retaining the snowpack this season relative to those seasons? It’s not as if we haven’t had any mixed/warm systems this season, but clearly something is helping the snowpack build faster. The snowpack here is currently higher than it was at this point in either of those seasons.

This is the NNE thread though, so it should literally be the place to talk about the climate/weather in this part of New England with no fear of resentment/reprisal.