powderfreak

Yeah, BTV is the true snow hole pit relative to latitude and surrounding climate. Much more than ALB. GFL/Queensbury is actually a sneaky great winter spot. They are right at the mouth of the Adirondack Park and they clean up in SWFE type winters. They CAD surprisingly well and always seem to have snow cover. I remember like 4 feet on the ground there in 07-08. I would bet money that GFL gets more than 65” a year, isn’t ALB 62”? I would’ve guessed 75-80”.

What a month of August man. Great to see an August of Yore. Average high of 78F this month and average low of 52F. Straight outta the Chamber weather handbook.

Yeah agreed with that retention for sure. Further NE the better. We also have a very persistent recent trend of big storms hitting mostly eastern areas. I just seem to remember the early 2000s and late 90s seemed to have the sweet spot for big dogs more inland. Even shitty winters like 2001-02 had a January storm that dropped 17.5” including 8”/2hrs. April 2000 was a surprise foot. New Years Eve in there had a 12+, 2000-2001 had several big storms where the ALY area seemed to jackpot, then 2002-2003 was huge. There was certainly a run in there during my high school years where it seemed every storm would back to the west and mid-level band would end up over ALY CWA. Theres a CSI banding study done in the 2000s that has the locations of huge mid-level bands and they are mostly across upstate NY into VT. Would be funny to take that and plot the last 10 years of banding and see the differences.

Obviously I’m well versed in the climo there growing up and visiting plenty since. My parents have had a bunch of storms that delivered bigger amounts than up here though in the past 10 years. It’s not a snow Mecca but again, Mitch and I have a good idea of that area and it’s not quite as drastic as some make it sound. I think BTV is much more of a snow pit than ALB. Also remember I grew up there in the time before every storm crushed BOS. The 1990s had plenty of real deep interior deform band type storms. Like ALB was too far east in a lot of storms.

My opinion is likely tainted by the last winter I lived in ALB area was 2002-2003 when like 110” fell. We had 50” in 10 days from Xmas Blizzard of 2002 (what’s better than 2 feet falling on Christmas afternoon?) and then the Jan 4, 2003 storm did it again. We had a solid foot later in the Presidents Day storm in February along with multiple smaller events. That was a great winter to end on in Albany.

Yeah that was my overall experience. Retention sucks but there is a lot worse shadowing right adjacent to the mountains. I honestly can’t remember a synoptic event growing up there where I thought we legitimately got shafted by terrain. I mean if it’s a March elevation event, sure but those you can see coming. All the local forecasters place the downslope minimums right near the NY/VT/MA borders and up into Washington County. And your right, the ALB area does better than a lot of the Mtn valley towns around the immediate mtns.

Low of 48F this morning... waiting on today’s heat.

Thanks, the retention is what you’d notice the most between the two locations. Not necessarily the total seasonal snow amounts.

Yeah that's what I had thought. It happens when there's big local variation, but it's interesting to see Hippy's take that it's been a disappointment given how just north has seen a near record season recently. 140" at your place is some serious snow. Reminds me of 2010-2011 up here that had 160" here with 200" at some lower elevation spots like J.Spin and Underhill. I don't think a lot of folks understand the frequency and amounts that lead up to 140-150"+ seasons.

Am I losing my mind or did Mt Snow and some other SVT mtns have one of their snowiest winters ever within the past few winters?

Yeah and the models always light that area up on SW flow....I think it’s just the southern slope of the Adirondack uplift. The other thing I used to love at ALB was the Hundson/Mohawk Convergence at the end of a nor’easter. Wind goes northerly and converges right over ALB area where the two big rivers merge and just downwind.... it’s very similar to the Champlain Valley Convergence but on a less extreme level. But it’s present enough to have studies published on it...grab an extra 2-4” on backend of a storm. Cool but still wouldn’t be my first choice for a snow location... but if forced to live there it does snow lol.

Mitch disagrees. Snow from Oct to May with max pack of 5 feet in his yard haha. But I actually think your area has been screwed more than most. Even SVT has had some sick deform bands in recent years. I do think ALB CWA up into VT has had better luck than your area recently.

Ha again I wasn’t comparing ALB to big SNE totals (but they’ve got you beat with March 1888 ) but they do get their 18+ storms. I guess it was just your initial post that made it seem like ALB averaged 39” or something terrible like that. It’s not a winter Mecca but it snows.

I’d go crazy living most places after Stowe lol. I still don’t think it robs that much, I lived it and still watch it closely. Of course there are events it is but the vast majority of ALB snowstorms revolve around mid-level banding which doesn’t give a shit about topography. Sure the hills around may average 70” instead of 62”, but it’s really not that big of a deal from what i saw. You would notice the preservation much more than any downsloping as the CAD isn’t there at all. It’s really all mid-level banding and ALB does well in those big interior storms and I can think of at least a handful of storms since 2002 where ALB local area jackpotted from being the pivot point. I’m not trying to sell it as a snow haven, but I just don’t think you’d notice downsloping as much as you think. The ones that do are the real stalled out easterly flow events like Dec 1992. Pretty much all other coastal events are just mid-level banding. SWFE also don’t really downslope from what I saw. It was pretty much sustained strong easterly flow. As soon as it goes NE though it’s all good. You just need that pivot like this one from 2014 that dropped 20-30” over the ALB area. A few other recent close calls:

That’s way over-sold in that area... from growing up there we did just fine in synoptic events, and a few times a winter you’d get good squalls coming down the Mohawk Valley from the Lakes. Sure there is once in a while some downslope event (but none really stand out to me growing up). It’s not like BTV with 4000ft peaks dropping to 200ft. Its the snow preservation that’s the stand out compared to like an ORH. I mean ALB is a 60-65” average... pretty standard for that latitude of I-90. It’s not great but it’s not like every event dries up. ALB does real well in interior coastal storms.

He must be thinking of NY. Troy, ME is right next to Bangor...there’d be no difference. Sounds like a college question to me. Guessing RPI or U.Maine.

Looking at it on a map I can’t imagine there is any difference. They are pretty much next to each other (Troy and Bangor). Or are you talking Troy, NY not Troy, ME? Troy, VT gets a shit ton of snow up near Jay Peak. As far as snowfall, there is a huge portion of interior Northeast climo that averages 50-75”. That seems to be the sweet spot for those that only see synoptic snow. Getting above that you need elevation, mesoscale snow or just be pretty far north in latitude.

Mid-70 temps over mid-50s dews? Let’s do this for a month straight.

lol, it is what it is. The time for 60-page threads for a D-2” type clipper are coming.

What’s as advertised? Anyone truly think the NAM runs of 4-6” of rain was going to occur over that large of an area? The HRRR and high res models showed how narrow it was likely going... stripes of 2”+ about the width of a town mixed in with lesser amounts. Green is 1-2” and dark green is 2-4.5”. It’s not like it didn’t rain. At least from the 50,000ft View.

I missed by 3. 0.74” here.

That's life in the mountains. Unblocked or blocked flows mean a lot depending on the wind direction. Unblocked east flow can crush the west slopes. Blocked east flow will hit the eastern side. Vertical wind & thermal profiles mean a lot.

If it was E/NE flow firehose off the Atlantic, DDH could've been rain despite over 2" of QPF. My guess is given that they would be downsloped (that doesn't mean a sharp QPF drop off necessarily, but temperatures will respond) and see a lot of "white rain"... big wet flakes that despite the rates still can't truly accumulate besides a wet slop.

I think you'll get a good soaking. It's not the jackpot 2-4" but it'll be soaking totals. Just a half inch or 3/4ths of an inch is what the grass and vegetation really needs. Big amounts are exciting I guess, but anything more than that runs off anyway.

69/67 up here at the ASOS...feels tropical with that 67F Td after days and days of dews in the 40s. Most humid weather in a week.