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NNE Winter 2015-16 Part 1


klw

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It is looking even more likely this weekend will be a miss. The ratter rolls on. There won't be too many opportunities this year so it definitely stings.

Pretty good model consensus on a miss this weekend. Obviously its frustrating seeing DCA looking at 2ft+, but you cant already be punting the next 2 months? I mean 2 months from now is Mid March, plenty of time for something bigger to happen.

 

11 of BTVs top 20 snowfalls happened in Feb or March.  7 in March and 4 in FEB.

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Pretty good model consensus on a miss this weekend. Obviously its frustrating seeing DCA looking at 2ft+, but you cant already be punting the next 2 months? I mean 2 months from now is Mid March, plenty of time for something bigger to happen.

 

11 of BTVs top 20 snowfalls happened in Feb or March.  7 in March and 4 in FEB.

 

No I am not really fully punting, just expressing frustration in seeing that and knowing it could be a decent wait for a real chance. Someone down there will exceed our current season total to date in one shot. In the meantime I am enjoying this nice little consolation prize ongoing right now.

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No I am not really fully punting, just expressing frustration in seeing that and knowing it could be a decent wait for a real chance. Someone down there will exceed our current season total to date in one shot. In the meantime I am enjoying this nice little consolation prize ongoing right now.

Totally get it. I moved to VT in NOV 2014 from extreme SEPA and never though I would have to leave VT and chase big snows back in that area.  :axe:  Some will double the season total possibly, at least mine....I have 16" not sure what BTVs total is.

 

Still time like we said though.

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Totally get it. I moved to VT in NOV 2014 from extreme SEPA and never though I would have to leave VT and chase big snows back in that area.  :axe:  Some will double the season total possibly, at least mine....I have 16" not sure what BTVs total is.

 

Still time like we said though.

where did you move from?

 

I relocated to BTV from Philly. 

 

If you want big snows, just go "up"...no matter what BTV has, there is always some big ones "up"

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where did you move from?

 

I relocated to BTV from Philly. 

 

If you want big snows, just go "up"...no matter what BTV has, there is always some big ones "up"

 Absolutely, I can be at 2500ft+ in 7-8 mins, so yea that helps with travel time chasing storms :lol: When we moved here we looked at places in the 1500-2000ft range, but for some reason my wife wanted to be near schools, shopping, relatives--I guess she didn't see my point of increased yearly snowfall  :)

 

I moved from Chester County west of Philly.  Near West Chester.

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where did you move from?

I relocated to BTV from Philly.

If you want big snows, just go "up"...no matter what BTV has, there is always some big ones "up"

Radar looks great in BTV, what's happening over there? I think the advisory could be expanded into BTV land as this is blocked flow all the way. Froude forecasts weren't nearly as blocked as radar shows but I had a feeling about that. Moisture moving in from due north often plays out like this...rather than more westerly which puts it on the east side.

Was just up at the mountain, so brutal today. Small Arctic flakes from downslope and high winds. Maybe an inch of sand up top so far today.

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where did you move from?

 

I relocated to BTV from Philly. 

 

If you want big snows, just go "up"...no matter what BTV has, there is always some big ones "up"

 

I grew up on Long Island but moved to NC for quite awhile. I moved to VT in spring 2013. BTV has 16.2 prior to today's event (which at least for me is impossible to measure with all the blowing and drifting on top of the older snow we just had). Normal to date is 35.5 which puts us at about 45% of normal right now. As it stands, today's event is going reasonably well. We are benefiting from some blocking and lake enhancement.

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Radar looks great in BTV, what's happening over there? I think the advisory could be expanded into BTV land as this is blocked flow all the way. Froude forecasts weren't nearly as blocked as radar shows but I had a feeling about that. Moisture moving in from due north often plays out like this...rather than more westerly which puts it on the east side.

Was just up at the mountain, so brutal today. Small Arctic flakes from downslope and high winds. Maybe an inch of sand up top so far today.

 

It looks like it is sliding east now so it should start winding down here and picking up on the western slopes.

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I grew up on Long Island but moved to NC for quite awhile. I moved to VT in spring 2013. BTV has 16.2 prior to today's event (which at least for me is impossible to measure with all the blowing and drifting on top of the older snow we just had). Normal to date is 35.5 which puts us at about 45% of normal right now. As it stands, today's event is going reasonably well. We are benefiting from some blocking and lake enhancement.

Down here in the southern Champlain Valley, we've had a stellar 8.7" of snow to date.  Ski conditions at Mount Independence have been phenomenal, with all trails open on a deep 2" base and ticket sales soaring.  With the resort gaining popularity with Brooklyn hipsters, lift line wait times have gone up in recent days to well over 20 minutes, but local farmers are scoring big points by brewing up organic hot chocolate made with fresh raw milk and infused with hints of chai.  The serving platter sweaters draped over the Jersey and Holsteins have also been a big hit.  Looks like another banner year for the ski industry.  Reporting live from Mount Independence Ski Resort, your intrepid report, ApacheTrout.

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I grew up on Long Island but moved to NC for quite awhile. I moved to VT in spring 2013. BTV has 16.2 prior to today's event (which at least for me is impossible to measure with all the blowing and drifting on top of the older snow we just had). Normal to date is 35.5 which puts us at about 45% of normal right now. As it stands, today's event is going reasonably well. We are benefiting from some blocking and lake enhancement.

 I get your frustration now.  You weren't around for '07 and the other bigger events in NVT.

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Yeah I missed those big ones for sure.

 

We had a good run for a while, but its been a dearth of storms lately.

 

The first winter I lived up here was December 2003 and BTV had like over 50" that month, including two 20-inchers.  I thought that was how it was...lol.  Moving up from ALB and going to UVM, and the first winter month I am there the ski resorts get 100"+ for the month and BTV even gets crushed once a week (there was an awesome +TSSN wet paste event too where it went from heavy rain to 10" of snow with lightningt). 

 

I was like, oh so this is how it is up here.  Little did I know that those storms don't grow on trees up here like they do in SNE, haha.

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PF- it's been snowing all day but really small windbeaten artcic flakes. Lots of blowing and drifting. Gut says a snow gauge would report 2-3" but that's not on the ground. Drifts are prob. 10" with lots of bare spots. 

 

I would agree that the dynamics should shift the flow a little and slide it up onto the core of the spine.  Temps need to warm however to get good snow growth...and winds need to slacken some.  Otherwise we'll just get rods and cones and sand. All the qpf will fall into dense dense arctic snow. 

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PF- it's been snowing all day but really small windbeaten artcic flakes. Lots of blowing and drifting. Gut says a snow gauge would report 2-3" but that's not on the ground. Drifts are prob. 10" with lots of bare spots.

I would agree that the dynamics should shift the flow a little and slide it up onto the core of the spine. Temps need to warm however to get good snow growth...and winds need to slacken some. Otherwise we'll just get rods and cones and sand. All the qpf will fall into dense dense arctic snow.

Ahh yeah that sounds about right. BTV has been in the best radar echoes, even better than the immediate west slopes. Hopefully this evening we can see it get more Spine centered.

Over here there's been maybe a half inch of Arctic small flakes in town. It's like sand walking in it, not the champagne powder that offers no resistance.

Last half hour has been snowing with dim sun out too. I think we are cooked on the east side but I'm always happy when it snows in BTV. Love downtown in the snow.

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We had a good run for a while, but its been a dearth of storms lately.

 

The first winter I lived up here was December 2003 and BTV had like over 50" that month, including two 20-inchers.  I thought that was how it was...lol.  Moving up from ALB and going to UVM, and the first winter month I am there the ski resorts get 100"+ for the month and BTV even gets crushed once a week (there was an awesome +TSSN wet paste event too where it went from heavy rain to 10" of snow with lightningt). 

 

I was like, oh so this is how it is up here.  Little did I know that those storms don't grow on trees up here like they do in SNE, haha.

 

Cherrypicking a threshold of 14", we had 11 such snowfalls in my first 11 winters here, and 2 during the past 6 (plus half of the current one.)  One of those two was 4/1/2011, which was nice to watch but gone in 2-3 days.  The other came while I was out of state.  A bunch of nice 10-13" events since the big dump in Feb 2009, but I've not seen anything near a blockbuster since that one, even while the 6 full winters averaged 101% of my avg annual snow.  (Meaning that the 11 storms noted above came with overall snow a tad BN.  Odd arrangement of snowstorms.)

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Why do I keep reading this storm thread and following every model run?  This is not a storm for us.  I should just put this computer down and pick it back up late this weekend....

 

...and since sulking over this why do we pay so much in tax dollars when NCEP can not gear up for big events with lots of web traffic.  Really hard for me to get into the site and it will get worse in the coming days.  This is the time they need the server capacity. It won't matter to me cause I'm putting the computer away yah right!

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So the flow on this event really shows through. Smuggs usually does a decent job measuring snow (sometimes it seems conservative- hopefully, they're sticking to this). Seems that N-NW facing bowl at Smuggs really helped in the orographics department with that northerly flow not pushing over into the Stowe side as much.

 

Smuggs 

24 hours  6-8" 

48 hour total 10-16" 

 

Stowe 

24 hour total 2-3" (wind blasted?)

72 hour total 6-10"

 

Bolton 

2-3" last 24

10-12" last 72 hours

 

Jay looks to be getting absolutely pummeled by wind- so there numbers are unusually low for Jay-style reporting compared to the nearby resorts (1-3" 24 hours, 7" for the event). The radar and moisture looked too good for them to be on the bottom of the NVT resorts. Maybe nobody wanted to go out and measure in 75 mph winds with -5 to -10 degree temps up high? Or the snow just got pounded into 7" slabs...

 

 Perhaps the more NW flow tonight could help up the totals at Bolton and Stowe. Also wouldn't be suprised to see Jay's number go up a fair bit.  Just a gut feeling.  Gonna head out early to checkout Bolton.

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Why do I keep reading this storm thread and following every model run?  This is not a storm for us.  I should just put this computer down and pick it back up late this weekend....

 

...and since sulking over this why do we pay so much in tax dollars when NCEP can not gear up for big events with lots of web traffic.  Really hard for me to get into the site and it will get worse in the coming days.  This is the time they need the server capacity. It won't matter to me cause I'm putting the computer away yah right!

Because there's still time. Sure, there's nothing good for us now, but it's the 6th maybe 7th inning. Not like things haven't turned around before.

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Event totals: 4.5” Snow/0.39” L.E.

 

Snow seemed to accumulate fairly slowly today at the house as viewed from the web cam, and it looked like flakes were generally on the small side.  I found about a half inch of new snow on my car at the Waterbury Park and Ride at the end of the day, but I could tell there was more at the house based on the car tracks in the driveway.  I found 1.9” of new snow on the snowboard, and it was pretty dense, coming in at around 11% H2O.

 

Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations:

 

New Snow: 1.9 inches

New Liquid: 0.21 inches

Snow/Water Ratio: 9.0

Snow Density: 11.1% H2O

Temperature: 11.5 F

Sky: Light Snow (1-5 mm flakes)

Snow at the stake: 7.5 inches

 

Only light snow was falling at observations time, but it’s really picked up since then and is falling somewhere above ½”/hr.  As of ~8:00 P.M. there was already a fresh 1.3” on the snowboard, so even the average rate over that period is above ½”/hr.  Flake size is up, with some in the 1 cm range, so that’s helping with the more rapid accumulation.  On the radar you can start to see the snow spilling over to the east side of the Greens, so perhaps the flow is becoming a bit less blocked:

 

19JAN16A.gif

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Hey J. Spin how does snowfall at your place correlate with Bolton Valley base and summit by your estimation?  You're pretty much due south, right?

 

In terms of quantity, our location runs just about 50% of what they record at the Bolton Valley summit elevations.  It varies somewhat from storm to storm of course, but it’s surprising how consistent that is from season to season.  I don’t know their base elevation snowfall, but I’d guess it’s somewhere around halfway between my numbers and the summit numbers, so maybe 230ish inches?  PF might have an idea of the base snowfall number since he tracks the local resort totals.  We’re almost exactly 4 miles SSE of the 3,150’ Vista Summit.

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As of ~8:00 P.M. there was already a fresh 1.3” on the snowboard, so even the average rate over that period is above ½”/hr.  Flake size is up, with some in the 1 cm range, so that’s helping with the more rapid accumulation.

 

Snowfall between 8:00 PM and 9:00 PM was 0.9”, so the snowfall rate has been running just shy of 1”/hr.

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Picked up about 1.5" of fluff at home overnight...actually brings the event total to around 4.5".

 

Up at the mountain there was around 3" on the snow board at the base since 2pm yesterday.  Given the very high winds overnight and what the groomers are saying, we played it safe and went 2-3" overnight and 3-5" in the last 24 hours. 

 

Apparently there is not much snow left on the groomed trails (blown clean of new powder)...but the sheltered stuff and bump runs should ski nicely as they can collect snow a bit better.

 

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