Eastern Closing 2019

Major update on my blog post.

https://madpatski.wordpress.com/2019/04 ... ck-week-3/

Update, April 17, 2:00pm: Wash out Easter Weekend. Ski areas are looking at all the rain in the forecast and wondering about the weekend plans. Regardless of the huge amount of snow, some decided that they will not open for one last weekend at Easter.


So far these include:
Camp Fortune
Le Massif
St-Mathieu
Val d'Irène
Whiteface
Burke
Smuggs


Other decided to reopen today Wednesday on the last sunny spring day prior to wet Easter weekend. Miller moved it closing date to today, while Mad and Smokey haven't made a call on this weekend.
Miller
Mad River Glen
Smokey
Click to expand...
 
Yes that's an ugly forecast but not an uncommon one for the Northeast in spring. The Mt. Mansfield Stake averages 5 days of rain in April.

IIRC one of the great features of the big 2001 season in the Northeast was that April was relatively dry. Therefore the spring corn skiing was more like we usually get in the West. And the natural snowpack must have been deep after the big March.

SoCal's season comes to an end this weekend at Snow Summit, Snow Valley and Mt. Baldy. Our current spring weather is not so uncommon either: 80+F in LA and 60+F in the mountains.
 
Tony Crocker":1kinw9o0 said:
Yes that's an ugly forecast but not an uncommon one for the Northeast in spring. The Mt. Mansfield Stake averages 5 days of rain in April.
Click to expand...

There is rain, and then there is RAIN.

I don't recall having rain affect most of the East over an entire long weekend. Alerts are given with the high risk of flooding across good parts of Ontario, Quebec to Vermont (and I presume some other states).

I decided to add an extra post due to the deluge of closures and skip one weekend approach.

From 38 to 17...ouch
Eastern Closing 2019: Deluge Easter edition – Week 3a
https://madpatski.wordpress.com/2019/04 ... n-week-3a/
 
Patrick posted a UVM website graph of recent years at the Mansfield Stake. Here are the top years:
MansfieldTopYears.jpg


If you create that graph yourself at https://waw.w3.uvm.edu/skivt-l/?Page=.% ... l.php&dir= you can put the mouse over the graph and see the exact values ranked for any date.

2018-19 crossed the 40-inch mark (cited by JSpin I think as when Vermont tree skiing comes into play) the earliest on Nov. 28. It did not pass its Nov. 29 peak of 46 inches until Jan. 2.

1981-82 had the highest base from Dec. 6 - Dec. 20. 1968-69 took over the top spot on Christmas Eve and held it continuously to Apr. 13 aside from 2018-19 regaining it briefly from Jan. 27 - Feb. 2.

1981-82 and 2018-19 had the second and third highest base depths from Jan. 12 - Mar. 11. Then the huge March of 2001 caught up and was in second place from Mar. 24 - Apr. 6. 1995-96 had the biggest April snowfall, the highest base depth from Apr. 17-20 and had similar runoff as 1968-69 in May/June.

Scott Braaten has been touting the Mansfield Stake snow depths for some time this season. Overall northern Vermont snowfall is in the 120% range, good but less than 1995-96 and much less than 2000-01. The big November of 2018 must carry disproportionate importance in creating and maintaining the deep snowpack as long as the rest of the season is decent.
 
Major update on my last post.

Update: Thursday evening:
Another April weekend, another terrible forecast weekend. From my point of view, flood levels are the highest in a generation, the rivers are rising and the call is still for a few days of rain. You know there is an issue when you have to look if the highways are still open if you want to go skiing.

A few things have come into focus the last few hours, rain and impact on the snowpack.
A few ski areas which generally don’t have much issues with lack of snow late in season are calling it a season due to the unfavourable forecast again this weekend are throwing in the towel like Massif du Sud, Mont Comi and Mont Sutton. Mont Orford decided not to try to reopen after not opening Easter weekend.
Others are warning that they might not open on certains days as planed or at all this weekend due to the same forecast: Ste-Anne and Vallée Bleue.

Other like Jay, Sugarloaf, without mentioning Sutton, have dialled back hopes to spinning beyond May 5. It looks like again this season, that the last spinning lifts will be at MSS and Kmart.

https://madpatski.wordpress.com/2019/04 ... 19-week-4/
 
The torrential rain during the Easter Long weekend had a huge impact on a human activities; some regions are seeing significant amount of flooding with the quantities of rain, huge snowpack and above normal temperatures.

The impact on skiing and skiing operations are also important, but it’s just a sport, not people lives. In one week, the snow depth at the top of Mount Mansfield has dropped over 2 feet. Although the snowpack went from 108″ to 83″, the amount of snow left is still well above the average for April 23rd and is similar to the amounts found at this time in 2007, 2009 and 2011 (81″-84″). It’s only trailing the 2017-18 season (99″) which got hit by a late season storms and found itself almost deeper as it had been all that season.
 
The energizer bunny 2018-19 ski season... still going strong.
Deep snowpack...even snow in some part of the East.

MSS changed their announced closing date from May 20 to TBD. Confirming next weekend May 26-27 and tentatively June 1-2.

Here is this week's blog post:
May is the new April? Eastern Closing 2019 – Week 7
https://madpatski.wordpress.com/2019/05 ... 19-week-7/
 
Tony Crocker":2c50uq3x said:
Was Killington's closing day June 1 or June 2?
Click to expand...

Closing day: MSS by 6 days
Killington, June 2.
MSS, June 8. (record)

Opening day: K by 7 days
Killington, October 19
MSS, October 26

Ski length: K by 1 day
K: October 19 - June 2
MSS: October 26 - June 8

Days in operations: K by 23 days.
K: 211
MSS: 188 (record)

If you count hours in operations, I'm pretty sure that MSS easily wins it on that count.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top