Upslope Snowfall Forecast From Tonight-Thursday

P

powderfreak

New member
To keep those of you who care, informed...

Will have a full discussion out later but here's my overall thinking:

This event will be a moderate to borderline significant snowfall for VT
ski resorts from MRG/SB region northward...and a significant snowfall for
Whiteface in the Adirondacks based on my own terms of significant being 8"
or greater.

Snow showers over the Adirondacks and Green Mountains increase in coverage
tonight with minimal accumulation by Wednesday morning in the Greens with
up to 3" in parts of the 'Dacks.

Snow continues in the 'Dacks on Wednesday with an additional 4-8" across
northern and western Adirondacks before tapering off on Wednesday night.
Total accumulations in the higher terrain of the north and western facing
slopes will be in the 6-12" range.

In the Green Mountains, snow continues on Wednesday with the heaviest snow
falling later Wednesday afternoon into Thursday. Total accumulations will
be 6-12" at Jay Peak with 5-10" at Stowe/Smuggs/Bolton and 4-8" down in
the SB/MRG region. From Killington on southward, locally up to 4" may
accumulate with most areas seeing a dusting to 2".

For the White Mountains, 4-8" possible at Bretton Woods and Canon,
mostly on Wednesday night into Thursday. Elsewhere, upslope snow
doesn't ever really materialize.

This will be a significantly more localized event than the last one.
Total precipitation amounts are going to be slightly less but the big
difference will be the ratios will be less. Not often do you see 30 or 40
to 1 snow ratios and I expect this to start out at 10:1 and go to 15:1 due
to warmer airmass in place and mid-March insolation during the day on
Wednesday. Thus, accumulations will be kept down. As always with upslope
events, all I can do is give a rough estimate and see what happens
(nowcast later tonight and tomorrow). My overall mindset with this event
has been conservative as I think the wind direction is not as favorable as
it could be for Vermont. It is certainly more favorable for the northern
Adirondacks, possibly allowing Whiteface to pick up a foot or more.

More technical discussion and thoughts later this evening but
 
Too little too late for my trip to either Stowe or Jay this weekend.

Unless this changes into a full on blower storm with 18-24" up in that area,
I just don't think it'll be worth the long drive up.

So I need someone to convince me otherwise.
 
We care man we care!

(I do anyway. Wish something was coming my way - Gore.)

Thanks Scott.
 
looking forward to your additional analysis and thanks for all your hard work scott! i appreciate the fact that you go for accuracy when you could easily cave to the desire to lean the forecast in the direction that people really want to hear, especially considering the current situation. cheers!
 
Many thanks. We'll be at Jay Saturday.

On Jay's site, it is calling for a foot by the weekend, accumulating to 20" by early next week. But that is not one dump, so how much will be blown away? Hopefully enough is on the groomers to have those all open this weekend.
 
Just skied Attitash today. Not too bad, but the snow that has been falling all day is really just squalls with minimal accumulations. The wind has been howling, especially at the summit.

We stopped at the Bretton Woods parking lot on the way back and folks there said that the condcitions were pretty good -- a few inches of fresh over ice/hardpack. Black diamonds are not really open -- it's mostly the blue cruisers.

Even now, at my place in Lincoln, it's just dusting up the roads and my car, without anything sticking. Pretty typical for March. What's not typical is that it's BARE GROUND everywhere except where they make snow.

As for Cannon, when we drove by from Bretton, the front face is very bare. I'm not sure if the mountain was open today. They were closed yesterday. Hardly worth stopping from what I could tell.

MSK
 
remydog":29iwanwd said:
Just skied Attitash today. Not too bad, but the snow that has been falling all day is really just squalls with minimal accumulations. The wind has been howling, especially at the summit.

We stopped at the Bretton Woods parking lot on the way back and folks there said that the condcitions were pretty good -- a few inches of fresh over ice/hardpack. Black diamonds are not really open -- it's mostly the blue cruisers.

Even now, at my place in Lincoln, it's just dusting up the roads and my car, without anything sticking. Pretty typical for March. What's not typical is that it's BARE GROUND everywhere except where they make snow.

As for Cannon, when we drove by from Bretton, the front face is very bare. I'm not sure if the mountain was open today. They were closed yesterday. Hardly worth stopping from what I could tell.

MSK
Click to expand...

There's actually decent accumulation in northern Vermont today, by all accounts.
 
definitely a localized storm only hitting select mountain locations. from what i understand, cannon's natural snow trails have been pretty bare all season. they had a foot and half fall on top of virtually nothing almost two weeks ago, but of course all that has long since melted. i thought they only closed monday but i am not certain. in either case, their web site is reporting definite operations for 2fer thursday tomorrow. hopefully that upslope will kick up some notch effect snow over night. though i could care less about cannon right now, i am anxiously awaiting the snowfall report from MRG tomorrow morning as rumor has it the call will be made tomorrow in regards to the weekend.
 
The reports at Jay suggest they may have nearly 2 feet of new in the past 24 hours. If I can get my kid out of bed, we'll make the 2 hour drive and see what it's all about.
 
remydog":1umv02g1 said:
The reports at Jay suggest they may have nearly 2 feet of new in the past 24 hours. If I can get my kid out of bed, we'll make the 2 hour drive and see what it's all about.
Click to expand...
their web site says 14-18 inches which i would hardly call nearly 2 feet, that equates to a foot and a half in my book. that is more like drifts up to half a foot knowing how those ranges work. and the jay publicity machine admitted that it was hard to measure and the wind was blowing everything around. i suspected the only place you'd likely find anything close to two feet of snow would be in the woods trails accessed by the tram and freezer, which will require a hike, because they have been off line and look to continue to stay off line due to wind. not trying to say don't go, but i think you are overly optimistic in thinking you will find anything close to two feet on any of their open trails. pow in the woods perhaps, but those main trails will likely be picked clean. the wind actually has me concerned for all ski areas in the greens that are getting this snow. i am taking snow report totals with a grain of salt at this point knowing what the wind could be doing out there and how desperate ski area marketing departments are to report a big dump at this point and get skiers to drive up.
 
this is a different storm with completely different set of circumstances. jay is only reporting 51 of their trials open after this storm whereas that last storm opened up everything. this snow fell on a frozen over layer of snow that had been heavily rained on then frozen solid whereas the last snow fall (which was twice as much snow as this) fell on an adequent base. i am just suggesting some skepticism, so far jay peak is the only ski area calling in a huge report and i am willing to bet none of that snow is on the main trails and a quick look at their trail map says a lot of their glades are still closed, which suggests to me they didn't even get enough to open a lot of their terrain back up. this isn't going to be anything like that report NHPH posted from the last big storm over a week ago. but i am sure the woods certainly hold the goods, given the recent rains though i wouldn't even think about going into the closed ones. who knows what is under that snow? clearly jay would get the most snow from this storm, i just think that their web site may be suggest it is going to be epic when in fact it was just damage control. i look forward to a report if you or any other FTO'ers go though and i would love nothing more than to have a foot stuck in my mouth for my skepticism.
 
Here is a report from a local and someone who skied Jay Thurs..... post is from last night 9pm

I didn't ski today, but a buddy of mine said it was pretty good. quite windy, but he said that tram side was more protected today and had top to bottom knee deep pow all the way down the left side of JFK. it snowed off and on today, but it has picked up this evening and is coming down nice now. I bet 8"-10" is a pretty good bet with the lower number probably being more accurate. tomarrow morning should be great, I'll be out first thing hitting my wind protected caches. looks like this dump is really working out
 
skimore":gvm2zkcp said:
Here is a report from a local and someone who skied Jay Thurs..... post is from last night 9pm

I didn't ski today, but a buddy of mine said it was pretty good. quite windy, but he said that tram side was more protected today and had top to bottom knee deep pow all the way down the left side of JFK. it snowed off and on today, but it has picked up this evening and is coming down nice now. I bet 8"-10" is a pretty good bet with the lower number probably being more accurate. tomarrow morning should be great, I'll be out first thing hitting my wind protected caches. looks like this dump is really working out
Click to expand...

Sounds fairly reliable. But it's just not enough to get me running to my car for the 6 1/2 hour drive. Wind is going to play havoc with this snow, and it won't be like 2 weeks ago. Jay is out for me.

Still willing to drive up to MRG or even Stowe if reports are encouraging, but the betting man in me says I'm staying home and skiing ice bumps this weekend.

In 5 days it'll be official...crappiest eastern winter that I can recall for the last 30 years.
 
just got back from sugarbush north. variable conditions with large ice patches. trails with some wind protection managed to keep some on them, drifts up to a foot and a half or more. very light snow, so still scraping the bottom. the woods blew in nicely, but alas, theres not much of a base. still fun, but I would advise to use caution in the woods, theres some stumps and rocks lurking under that fresh. exterminator was the trail of the day for me.
 
MRG just reported that the events for the weekend have been cancelled and they likely will not open. re-evaluating the decision tomorrow if they get more snow. they actually posted a warning on the web site discouraging people from hiking!! :oops: :roll: :shock:
 
Jay now has over 65 trails open and lifts off windhold. Pretty sweet pic of the day too, although I'm sure that the location was carefully chosen to maximize the drool factor.

I can see I'm probably going to regret my decision to bag my trip. So if you're up at Jay whooping and hollering in the woods, you can thank your lucky stars I decided to stay home!
 
Pretty sweet pic of the day too, although I'm sure that the location was carefully chosen to maximize the drool factor.
Click to expand...
that's for sure! glad to see they got a bump in trail count. i would like to see some pics of the non-glade non-tree trails, i doubt you would see the same epic shot. but powder in the trees works for me. i might return to the scene of the accident if the trees get refreshed again these next two nights.
 
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