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NNE Fall Thread

dryslot

By dryslot,
in New England

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backedgeapproaching

backedgeapproaching

Posted
Posted

Will and others were discussing the Dec 2008 analogs in the Model thread, so was curious and looked at the local COOP data for those DEC days and looks like about 17" over those 3 days--but depth was never higher than 10"..lol--not Dendrite approved. 

Anyway-looks like the DEC that many were saying could be good months ago is starting to get in sight (already well established in NVT I know). Hope everyone can cash in someway or another.

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mreaves

mreaves

Posted
Posted
1 minute ago, ORH_wxman said:

Congrats on the best December there since 2007.

From your lips to God's ear.  We're no Stowe, I only have a measly 3'-4' on the ground right now!  J/K I am pretty serious though when I say that I feel like I've seen more winter so far this year than I did all all of last year.

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ORH_wxman

ORH_wxman

Posted
Posted
4 minutes ago, mreaves said:

From your lips to God's ear.  We're no Stowe, I only have a measly 3'-4' on the ground right now!  J/K I am pretty serious though when I say that I feel like I've seen more winter so far this year than I did all all of last year.

In all seriousness, the pattern looks excellent for you. It looks merely good down here, but you are in an area that can see snow a lot of ways in this pattern. Obviously there's ways it can go wrong, but this is totally different than the past two Decembers.

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tamarack

tamarack

Posted
Posted
30 minutes ago, backedgeapproaching said:

Will and others were discussing the Dec 2008 analogs in the Model thread, so was curious and looked at the local COOP data for those DEC days and looks like about 17" over those 3 days--but depth was never higher than 10"..lol--not Dendrite approved. 

Anyway-looks like the DEC that many were saying could be good months ago is starting to get in sight (already well established in NVT I know). Hope everyone can cash in someway or another.

Only got 2.1" on 19-20, nearly 24 hr of steady -SN.  No complaints, though, as 5.5" on the 17th and 15.5" (at temps near 10F) in the 21-22 blizzard kicked the snowpack from 1" to 19".

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Madroch

Madroch

Posted
Posted

Hmmm... sick day tomorrow on Mansfield? maybe a little more tonight... winds may be up a bit though..any possible affect on lift ops... Stowe is usually pretty good but I don't know enough about direction etc to estimate impact...

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powderfreak

powderfreak

Posted
Posted
19 minutes ago, Madroch said:

Hmmm... sick day tomorrow on Mansfield? maybe a little more tonight... winds may be up a bit though..any possible affect on lift ops... Stowe is usually pretty good but I don't know enough about direction etc to estimate impact...

I'm currently leaning towards no impacts but the Gondola would be the number 1 suspect for wind hold.  The new FourRunner Quad has been a horse the past couple winters...it takes a real lot of wind to put that thing on hold.

If possible, I would hit it tomorrow before the weekend crowds get it.  They'll trash this place, lol.

It really is incredible out there....already shoveling roof-tops on December 8th with a 17" snow depth at the parking lot level.   We are like 60% open and most of it is natural snow top-to-bottom.  It has been snowing every day.

I generally am pretty good at staying away from hyperbole; this is the best week of snowfall and skiing I've seen in a few years.  And these photos were taken during this morning's light snow...before the maelstrom squall that dropped 4.5" in 90 minutes.

The-snow-is-here-with-30-inches-in-the-l

 

I mean this isn't even a good photo but look at the snow on those tree branches.  This is at the bottom of Chin Clip.  Normally you need snowmaking to blast a tree to look like this but just the whole mountain is caked.

Skiing-through-a-winter-wonderland..jpg

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powderfreak

powderfreak

Posted
Posted
2 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

Wow. Looks epic. Man as much as I want to see that...glad the ghosts are gone. Seriously. Good for you guys in the ski industry. 

Thanks man...the stoke level is high.  Every event for the past 7 days has over-performed.   Last winter it would've taken an act of God to get even 3.5" in the parking lots.

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CoastalWx

CoastalWx

Posted
Posted
12 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

Thanks man...the stoke level is high.  Every event for the past 7 days has over-performed.   Last winter it would've taken an act of God to get even 3.5" in the parking lots.

I thought some of the mesos had several inches for you today? I bet the warm lakes for now are helping too. 

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powderfreak

powderfreak

Posted
Posted
11 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

I thought some of the mesos had several inches for you today? I bet the warm lakes for now are helping too. 

Yeah that is true...sometimes its hard after last year to believe them as every event they had more snowfall than expected.

Like last year I would've expected that to be a dusting to an inch or something of graupel instead of absolute puking dendrites.

Anyway, another 2.75" at 1,500ft overnight (I had about an inch at the house) and an estimated 4" above 3,000ft from grooming.  Winds hit 78mph on the ridgeline though so this is a less confident snow measurement at this point until I can really look at it in the daylight.  I sometimes fear in these situations where there's a ton of snow sitting in the trees, that high winds can start to bring that down and mess up the readings.  Have to look at it in the daylight.

 

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powderfreak

powderfreak

Posted
Posted
15 hours ago, ono said:

hey PF do you check on the Mansfield stake regularly, or not so much- it is a little bit out of the way if memory serves.  how do they compare in your experience?

Just wanted to revisit this after the evening reading...

So I had 5" of fluff on the board and the COOP reported 2.5" but with 0.25" of liquid.  There's no way it was 10:1 ratio snow, but the liquid makes sense with the 5" of fluff as 20:1 ratio makes sense on the ground.  The snow depth also increased by 4"...and there was no wind yesterday so that also seems to lean towards 4-5" during the day yesterday. 

Basically certain parts of the COOP line up nicely with what I see though the actual raw snowfall value does not. 

Daily Hydrometeorological Data
National Weather Service Burlington VT
630 PM EST WED DEC 8 2016

Station            Precip   Temperature   Present         Snow
                   24 Hrs   Max Min Cur   Weather     New Total SWE
...Vermont...
Mount Mansfield     0.25    24  18  18                2.5  30
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ono

ono

Posted
Posted
2 hours ago, powderfreak said:

Just wanted to revisit this after the evening reading...

So I had 5" of fluff on the board and the COOP reported 2.5" but with 0.25" of liquid.  There's no way it was 10:1 ratio snow, but the liquid makes sense with the 5" of fluff as 20:1 ratio makes sense on the ground.  The snow depth also increased by 4"...and there was no wind yesterday so that also seems to lean towards 4-5" during the day yesterday. 

Basically certain parts of the COOP line up nicely with what I see though the actual raw snowfall value does not. 


Daily Hydrometeorological Data
National Weather Service Burlington VT
630 PM EST WED DEC 8 2016

Station            Precip   Temperature   Present         Snow
                   24 Hrs   Max Min Cur   Weather     New Total SWE
...Vermont...
Mount Mansfield     0.25    24  18  18                2.5  30

yeah... the can on top is obviously not great- but it may be hard to change given that this is the method that's been used for so long, and the sampling would be a new dataset.

 

Looking at the numbers, 2007-2008 had a ~110" max snowdepth, and a pretty big meltdown around Christmas (from 60" to 40"- what a start, though).  Total snowfall for the year from the can looks to be 250"?

This year, the measurement from the can on top is cumulatively 40"... throw in total meltdowns and all- it seems like the can method comes up with accumulations closer to what falls at the base of the mountain than the top- just eyeballing it.  

how far back do the daily (decently accurate) records at your office go?  curious- starting to mess around with some snowfall/precip/snowpack data for a personal side project (and to dust off some stats/coding stuff done a long time ago)- basically, wanted to look at the relationship between pre- X-mas snowfall and overall season totals/depths at Mansfield.  

In other news, the sugarbush webcam deserves a nickname- Drifty McDriftface.  It's quickly become a crater of snow and measures a nice concave pocket at 4000'.  They need to really start shoveling a big area around that thing, otherwise it won't be there much longer... 

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J.Spin

J.Spin

Posted
Posted

Event totals: 0.7” Snow/0.05” L.E.

 

There’s been no obvious break between the lake-effect snow we’ve seen since yesterday and any snow that is associated with the current arctic frontal passage, so I’m keeping these as a single event.  Roger Hill did also note in his morning broadcast that some of the snow that we’re seeing in the area today could be due to enhancement from Lake Champlain. 

 

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

 

New Snow: 0.5 inches

New Liquid: 0.03 inches

Snow/Water Ratio: 16.7

Snow Density: 6.0% H2O

Temperature: 25.7 F

Sky: Light Snow (2-10 mm flakes)

Snow at the stake: 3.5 inches

 

Also of note, I’ve gone ahead and used the “Brief Note” field in the event area of Kevin’s New England Snow website to provide the identifying information for each of this season’s 11 storms/events thus far.  I have that information in my data anyway, so my plan is to keep that going so the reference information will be there for those that might use it.

 

It looks like the system with potential impacts in the area Sunday into Monday has been named Winter Storm Caly, so that will serve as an easy identifier for whatever happens with that event.  The current thoughts from the BTV NWS in their discussion are something in the 4-7” range the chance for a bit of mix in susceptible areas, but the exact storm track will obviously decide how things go:

 

Area Forecast Discussion

National Weather Service Burlington VT

459 AM EST Fri Dec 9 2016

 

.LONG TERM /SUNDAY THROUGH THURSDAY/...

As of 459 AM EST Friday...Late Sunday through Sunday night sees snow spread across the area in strong isentropic lift associated with low pressure system approaching from southern Lake Michigan area. 00Z ECMWF and GFS showing fairly good agreement as sfc low tracks to eastern Great Lakes come early Monday, transitioning to more of a coastal low Monday evening/night near Nova Scotia. Differences in exact track and timing remain with low level thermal profiles differing as well. Overall expect bulk of precip to be in the form of snow starting Sunday evening through Monday morning, possibly some wintry mix Monday during the day for southern Champlain Valley and south central VT. Cold air at all levels rushes back in Monday evening as the sfc low becomes coastal. Models indicate heaviest QPF to occur Monday morning, making for a sloppy commute to say the least. As wintry precip continues all day Monday, expect Monday afternoon commute to also be affected. Wrap around moisture behind departing sfc low in west to NW flow will see snow tapering off Tuesday morning, concentrated around the higher terrain. Storm total snowfall forecast currently sitting at widespread 4 to 7 inches possible through 06Z Tuesday. Lastly, wind could also be an issue on Monday as strong southerly 850mb jet of 30-40kts could persist through Tuesday.

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powderfreak

powderfreak

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, J.Spin said:

Here are the snowfall numbers I’m seeing for the Vermont ski areas for our current LES/artic frontal passage event using 24 to 48-ish hour totals:

 

Jay Peak: 16”

Burke: 3”

Smuggler’s Notch: 7”

Stowe: 9”

Bolton Valley: 3”

Sugarbush: 10”

Killington: 5”

Okemo: 2”

Bromley: 1”

Stratton: 3”

Mount Snow: 0”

We are going to be up to 10" now.  I found a little more than 5" of very fluffy snow this morning on the 3,000ft board, on top of the 4.5" from yesterday's squalls.

Still snowing too.  Like eyewall, had some good bursts of thick dendrites in the air.  Pure fluff at this point.  Nosedive Glades is knee deep champagne right now.

I just looked, with 83" on the season, it took us until February 11th last year to hit that mark.

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