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NNE Winter. Will it ever snow again?


mreaves

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Great shots, eyewall.  The quarry is now on my list of places to visit this year.

 

The year-to-year comparisons for the ice and snow cover for Lake Champlain are shocking.  It's important to note that the cold weather of Jan-March kept the ground covered in snow, as we certainly didn't have much snowfall post December last year.  I went back to my records and found that, from January 1, 2015 through March 6, 2016, the lower Champlain Valley (Orwell/Benson/Shoreham) recorded only 26.4 inches of snow (14" this year).  How's that grab you for a deficit?

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The lack of snowpack has got me thinking, are we at risk for a Tolland style drought

 

Funny, I had the same thoughts yesterday. 

 

With the lack of snow pack to charge, in particular, Lake Champlain, I wonder how lake levels will be going forward through the year.

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Yeah, I'm learning to  be careful of wind.  When it's calm at ground level at can be very different several hundred feet up.  Your shots are amazing and making me want to buy the new Phantom 4.  Getting tired of my lousy 1200-1500 foot range!

Hah, you've got it bad.  You doing a pre-order?

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Funny, I had the same thoughts yesterday. 

 

With the lack of snow pack to charge, in particular, Lake Champlain, I wonder how lake levels will be going forward through the year.

 

I do some hydro sampling for BTV on Mansfield and there's still some water in the mountains.  I had 14" of liquid tied up in just like 34" of snow last Wednesday at 3,000ft and 4" water in 12" snow at 1,500ft.

 

However that pales in comparison to like a 2012-2013 winter when there was 27" of liquid in like 70" of snowdepth (though that was in early April). 

 

I did see BTV issued a "near-normal flood risk" this spring from snowmelt and ice jams. I was surprised to see that as I would think its a much lower than normal flood risk, and I know their hydrologist thinks so.  I wonder if its a situation where you can only state its going to be a normal risk or above normal risk... but they don't want to say there's little risk for spring flooding and then you get a 3-4" rain event and everyone floods.

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Sneaky set-up for a little snow accumulation tomorrow morning into midday...

 

Columns are cold enough as its between 12-18z...after 18z it'll change to rain showers below 1,500ft but looks like the mountains could score a couple inches and maybe the mountain valleys to west slopes. 

 

GFS for tomorrow morning...

 

 

GGEM for tomorrow morning...

 

 

RGEM snowfall...

 

 

 

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Great shots eyewall.  Great day for flying high.  Mount Washington's wind is only around 25mph.   I thought it would be very cool to summit Mansfield or Washington and get shots from above.  Just so hard to do it with wind.  Probably some kind of flight restriction above the Mount Washington observatory.  Don't know if Mansfield summit is a part of the Stowe resort property.

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Great shots eyewall.  Great day for flying high.  Mount Washington's wind is only around 25mph.   I thought it would be very cool to summit Mansfield or Washington and get shots from above.  Just so hard to do it with wind.  Probably some kind of flight restriction above the Mount Washington observatory.  Don't know if Mansfield summit is a part of the Stowe resort property.

 

I don't know who owns the Mansfield summit but I thought it was the state. Yeah it was the perfect combo I was waiting for of high pressure overhead and a day off LOL.

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I don't know who owns the Mansfield summit but I thought it was the state. Yeah it was the perfect combo I was waiting for of high pressure overhead and a day off LOL.

 

Yes the state owns the Mansfield summit, and all of Mansfield for that matter.  Stowe leases their land from the state, but that doesn't include any above tree-line areas.  Stowe does own a lot of the land across the street on Spruce Peak (which is why that's where the infrastructure development is).  But Mansfield is state land, as is Smugglers Notch.  I believe Smuggs also leases a good deal of their land from the state.

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Bluebird beauty

 

Yeah you know this is actually the time of year where while it was beautiful, the skiing probably would've been a little better if it was another 5-7F warmer.  We are moving into spring skiing mode if its not going to snow...I know you know the joys of skiing when its sunny and like 40F.  Just enough to soften the surface into corn but not turn it into foot deep mush.

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Mansfield looks like mid winter.   From over my house looking north to Franconia Notch and the Whites it looks like mid April.

 

Looks like mid-winter with a foot of natural at the base and 3 feet at the top...the funny thing is 6" looks the same as 60" from a distance.

 

But I am surprised your area doesn't have a bit more cover than that photo shows... you CAD like its your job.  But I guess you have to have it in the first place to preserve it with CAD.  Snow cover must start not far north or east of you?

 

Not much here with only 3" of white material (hard to call it snow) on the open lawn...3" that you can walk on.  Sheltered areas and north facing spots may have a couple more, wind blown wide open fields have less.

 

It'll all be a dream come Thursday.

 

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But I am surprised your area doesn't have a bit more cover than that photo shows... you CAD like its your job.  But I guess you have to have it in the first place to preserve it with CAD.  Snow cover must start not far north or east of you?

 

 

PF  That shot looking north is somewhat deceitful because its looking north so you see the open south facing fields and pastures.  Looking straight down on my house today you can see the open areas are snow free but the woods still have a fair amount of snow.  Our biggest storm was 5 or 6" back in December so your right CAD only works if you have a base.  I don't think we ever had more than 7 or 8" on the ground at one time! 

post-268-0-72855400-1457309360_thumb.png

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Just started snowing at the mountain...its incredible how light it is at 6:30am.  Watched the virga start up high a little while ago as the mountain slowly become enveloped and now its falling all the way to the base area.  Took about 10 minutes to saturate.

 

Class WSW flow downslope in the BTV area off the Adirondack High Peaks region... where if you look at the composite radar there are plenty of echoes aloft over BTV as the band moves overhead.

 

 

But then look at the lower level scans and the precip dries up as it hits BTV and then redevelops as it hits the Greens and upslopes again.  We generally do alright relatively speaking in WSW flow set-ups on the eastern side of the Greens, as its usually a deep layer flow that upslopes from the Champlain Valley into the Spine and drops the payload on the east side.  In this case the "payload" might be about a tenth of an inch of QPF, lol.

 

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Just started snowing at the mountain...its incredible how light it is at 6:30am.

 

We’ve had a few rounds of flurries at the house thus far, but nothing accumulating yet.  BTV NWS forecast is calling for an inch down at our place, and 1-3” on Mansfield, but the forecast discussion does mention the potential for several inches in the mountains:

 

AS PRECIP ARRIVES SOME EVAPORATIONAL COOLING WILL OCCUR WITH SURFACE TEMPS COOLING TO NEAR THE WET BULB...SUPPORTING SNOW...BEFORE CHANGING BACK TO RAIN IN THE VALLEYS. MAINLY SNOW IN THE MOUNTAINS...BEFORE ENDING AS A LITTLE RAIN BY EARLY THIS AFTERNOON. SNOW ACCUMULATIONS WILL BE A DUSTING TO SEVERAL INCHES.

 

With the lowering clouds and early flakes in the air, it definitely has the look and feel of an incoming snowfall out there at the moment.

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Just started snowing at the mountain...its incredible how light it is at 6:30am.  Watched the virga start up high a little while ago as the mountain slowly become enveloped and now its falling all the way to the base area.  Took about 10 minutes to saturate.

 

Class WSW flow downslope in the BTV area off the Adirondack High Peaks region... where if you look at the composite radar there are plenty of echoes aloft over BTV as the band moves overhead.

 

attachicon.gifMarch7_composite.gif

 

But then look at the lower level scans and the precip dries up as it hits BTV and then redevelops as it hits the Greens and upslopes again.  We generally do alright relatively speaking in WSW flow set-ups on the eastern side of the Greens, as its usually a deep layer flow that upslopes from the Champlain Valley into the Spine and drops the payload on the east side.  In this case the "payload" might be about a tenth of an inch of QPF, lol.

 

attachicon.gifMarch7.gif

Eyewall is now pounding his head on his desk as he reads this post. 

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Wow, very cool, I just caught the onset of the heavier snowfall here on I-89 heading out of Richmond.  Right at valley level we weren’t in the snow yet, but I could look back up the Winooski Valley and see numerous tendrils of snow stretching to various elevations among the peaks and lower hills.  I could tell I was in the brief period of being able to watch the snow fall at long distances with good visibility before we got enveloped.  Then, in a few moments as we headed toward French Hill, the wall of precipitation hit and we were in it.  It’s not especially heavy snow down here in the Champlain Valley, but those in the area that don’t have any snow falling yet should see some in a bit.

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Getting a burst of snow snow before it changes over. I am not pounding my head anymore as I have already written this winter off as a complete and total failure and I am moving on in looking forward to the next one.

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Hey I lived there for 6 years until deciding I had enough.

 

Hehe, I lived in the CPV for ~25 years of my life, but I was either a kid and/or forums like this didn’t exist, so I was blissfully ignorant of the dramatic differences in winter weather just a few miles to the east.

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Hehe, I lived in the CPV for ~25 years of my life, but I was either a kid and/or forums like this didn’t exist, so I was blissfully ignorant of the dramatic differences in winter weather just a few miles to the east.

Yeah where as I lived in BTV and worked at Stowe so I saw the whole thing play out daily on my commutes. Leave home with no snow, hit snow around Richmond, gets heavier as you move through into Waterbury, might lighten up in the RT 100 corridor (or might not) but then comes back strong when you turn up 108 heading towards the base of Stowe. Then repeat the process in reverse in the afternoon.

After years of doing that I was like you know, I don't need to live in the jackpot but I'd at least like to be in the game. So lived one winter in Jonesville which was a little better but JSpin can tell you that's also a local hole. Living in Stowe is worlds snowier and more wintery than either BTV or Jonesville...both in snowfall and preservation.

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