Tony Crocker wrote:jamesdeluxe wrote:Did I pass the test?
Yes. Outstanding questions remain.
1) How much, if any extra snow, does Jay get vs. Mt. Mansfield? Not easily resolvable due to Jay's imprecise snowfall methodology.
2) Where and why does snowfall decline rapidly as you go north of the US-Canada border? Beyond Mt. Sutton, elevation, orientation and overall barrier size of mountains are logical negative factors. Sutton itself remains a question according to JSpin and powderfreak, so I'm trying to contact Sutton directly, with no success so far.
jamesdeluxe wrote:Admin was not quite correct to claim that the large discrepancy between base and summit was BS.
He wasn't correct at all. a 25% difference is very common, fairly routine in Colorado where rain has zero influence. At some places like Squaw Valley and Park City it's much more. At Alta that difference is unusually low, which would understandably influence admin's view on the topic. The difference between the UDOT measurements at Alta's base and the ski area's measurements halfway up the hill are less than 10%. Alta's snowfall is impressive by any measure, but for the base of the ski area it's especially remarkable.
1) My gut would say the increase would be consistent with the steady rise in accumulation as you move up the Spine. That would put Jay at probably 10-15% more than Stowe/Smuggs/Bolton, as those areas get 10-15% more than Sugarbush. That could put Jay as much as 30-45" more than Stowe over the course of a season, which is pretty much what Stowe does over Sugarbush most years. Recently there have been some winters where Jay has reported up to 100" more than Stowe/Smuggs just one county south. For example just this past winter, Stowe's 284" and Smuggs 272" (which I believe that difference was from November, with both areas identical in snowfall Dec-Apr) were countered by Jay Peak reporting 373". That just isn't anywhere near possible to me, especially given the character of storms this past winter. There was no notable event(s) where it was say raining in Lamoille county and snowing in Orleans county. No event where Jay got like 3 feet while only 10" fell one county south.
The only way Jay could report 100" more than Smuggs is if where they are "taking their measurments" (ie skiing through powder and estimating depths, possibly in drifts) is if the spot they often ski accumulates like 1.5 times reality due to drifting (say on the Face chute glades). Say 12" falls, but that given area of the mountain receives and skis 18" deep (with bare windswept summit), that's what you see on the report. I think Admin's accounts just reinforce this to me based on what a person with close knowledge to this seasons' snow reporting said. Similar to like if Mammoth Mountain measured snow in the 50-foot deep drifts just under the bare rock summit ridge.
My take is that skiers & riders should be able to find deeper areas than the top number on a snow report due to wind-loading. That's where people often assume my stakes under-report but I truly believe I have a very representative spot. Skiers know the deep parts on the mountain...every mountain has them. That spot when a foot of snow falls and you know that certain glade or aspect is going to be DEEP. I should run a study one of these seasons and stick a board in terrain well known for being deeper than anywhere else, and see what the difference is. Maybe I could get a 360" average there or something, haha.
2) Sutton remains a big question for me. I don't believe it is too narrow or too small to not have orographic lift like Jay Peak. A 200" average there has to be wrong, IMO. This season though, they recorded 502cm which is 197". So that would mean that Jay Peak, only 10 miles as the crow flies, picked up 180" more snow than them. That doesn't sit right and I really can't see how that could ever happen, honestly.