Winter 2013-2014 Final Grades

[TauntonBlizzard2013]

Now that we are a few months removed from the last snowfall and snow chances for many, what would you grade this past winter? Now that the emotions of a bitter ending have subsided, I think many will be able to give a fair grade of the winter as a whole, and not focus solely on the crappy ending.

 

Grade: B+

 

Pros:

Pretty impressive cold shots

two rare and impressive cold snow events

several events that popped up and trended better at very short lead times

number of measurable snows

above average snowfall

longevity- seeing first snow in november, last snow in mid april.

 

Cons:

Rainers in between cold shots

missed chances

storms shunted south almost all month in march

lackluster ending

lacking a signature event

never reaching 12" during any one storm

couple storms took a turn for the worse close in

[tamarack]

Shamelessly borrowing your format...

 

Grade: B+  (A for cold, B- for snow.  The actual numbers from my grading "system" came out A- and C+, and I subjectively raised them due to things found in "Pros".)

 

Pros:

--Coldest DJFM of 16, by 1.5F.  Coldest March ever for many NNE sites, including Farmongton COOP (records since 1893.)

--115% average snowfall, with three months each with over 30".

--Five storms over 10", including two 13" events a week apart in mid-March.

--Number 2 winter for snow depth days, though wa-a-ay behind 07-08.

--Among WSW-level events, 3 overperformed and only one under (March 12-13: Forecast 18-24", got 13.5".  Farmington:18.5".)

 

Cons:

--January!  Despite temps 3F below average and precip 30% above average, least snowy of 16 Januarys. 

--Three Jan rainstorms in 10 days, 3.3" wasted midwinter precip.  Rest of month was cold whiffs.

--Late start - very little snow prior to 12/15.

--Sudden end - No real snowfall, only slops and flurries, after 3/20.  (NNE-centric comment)

--lacking a signature event.  Last one here was Feb. 2009.

 

Edit:  Another Con was spending 2/3 of the winter dead last among Mainiacs posting in KevinMA's table, and trailing most other contributers.  That changed later, of course. 

[dendrite]

Another 100" season and plenty of cold. The depth was over 20" for much of the winter and peaked at about 3ft. The rainers in Jan were frustrating, but in most winters it happens. You're not going to hit every event.

The cold NDJFM was great, but we didn't get anything overly extreme here. March was extreme, but that just made it seem like we went through 2 Februaries. The OH Valley had their "polar vortex", but we didn't get in on that like they did. I like my cold with near -30C 850s or of the 1040-1045mb high variety. Early Jan had the best shot with the below zero snowfall and the 0s/-10s here the next 24hrs.

Just looking at the final numbers, it's hard not to go A-/A though. I have to keep telling myself to keep the spoiled bias out of the equation and to compare it to climo.

[ORH_wxman]

Solid B.

 

The perfectly coriographed whiffs in March kept it from being higher....but otherwise the winter was generally characterized for its cold and slew of warning snowfall events. The below 0F snowfall in early January was historic in nature. Some ill-timed torches in late December and January were also unwelcome.

 

But despite those imperfections, I cannot honestly and objectively grade the winter lower than a B when there was above average snowfall and solidly below average temperatures unless the criteria becomes skewed toward more and more subjective measures.

[CoastalWx]

A/A-..probably closer to A.

 

Every winter has a cutter that blows away snowpack so that's no big deal. Most of the A/A+ winters have a 2 footer in them..but this wasn't far off from it. Solid cold and one big snow event with 2 others over 10". A solid March could have thrown this to an A+. A lot of nickel and dime events that added up as well. 

[powderfreak]

Well I think of A as a true top tier winter...like university grades, "average" should come out around B-/C+ territory. Below normal snow this winter (though only 10-20%), but nice cold overall. Awesome March, horrific January, meh December, and dead on average February. Really only two warning events, and waiting till Feb for a warning event in NVT is pretty meh.

I'd stick with a grade representative of a near average winter, C+/B-. Can't go higher than a B- though.

[powderfreak]

Every winter has a cutter that blows away snowpack so that's no big deal.

One cutter would've been fine, a 3-week long abortion starting with the rain/ice storm near Xmas was ugly. January was every bit as awful as March was sweet, lol.

Cons:

--January! Despite temps 3F below average and precip 30% above average, least snowy of 16 Januarys.

--Three Jan rainstorms in 10 days, 3.3" wasted midwinter precip. Rest of month was cold whiffs.

[CoastalWx]

One cutter would've been fine, a 3-week long abortion starting with the rain/ice storm near Xmas was ugly. January was every bit as awful as March was sweet, lol.

 

 

I'm just speaking for my area....the best winters have featured mutilation in terms of snowpack. I expect it. Some aren't as bad as others..but they have all featured nasty torches.

[powderfreak]

I'm just speaking for my area....the best winters have featured mutilation in terms of snowpack. I expect it. Some aren't as bad as others..but they have all featured nasty torches.

Yeah it makes sense...and honestly after it melts, guess it doesn't matter how many more times it rains. It's bare ground anyway. I almost would've liked to just do one big melt out, rip the bandaid off quickly instead of watching snow slowly melt for three weeks during the heart of winter haha.

It was like 15" depth, then rain, 9" depth, then more rain, 5" depth, then more rain, and finally the abortion ends with 1-2" of clear ice pack.

[TalcottWx]

B

<see wills post>

[CoastalWx]

Yeah it makes sense...and honestly after it melts, guess it doesn't matter how many more times it rains. It's bare ground anyway. I almost would've liked to just do one big melt out, rip the bandaid off quickly instead of watching snow slowly melt for three weeks during the heart of winter haha.

It was like 15" depth, then rain, 9" depth, then more rain, 5" depth, then more rain, and finally the abortion ends with 1-2" of clear ice pack.

 

You could make an argument for A- I suppose...but I have to reference climo too. 

[tamarack]

One cutter would've been fine, a 3-week long abortion starting with the rain/ice storm near Xmas was ugly. January was every bit as awful as March was sweet, lol.

 

 

Another Con that I left out (it was nearly erased from memory by Feb/Mar) was the abnormally high number of 2" or less "storms" that included many hours of snowfall at rates 0.1"/hr or less - I count 9 such events in Dec/Jan.  The classic, of course, was the tortuously long graze from the Jan 2-3 cold storm, 2.1" in about 24 hr of continuous snowfall (noteworthy because temps ranged -8 to -12 thru the event.)  Nickel and dime events this past winter were pennies and ha-pennies in my area.

[J.Spin]

C-

 

With a C as average, I went with a C- for this season at our site and along the spine of the Northern Greens in general.  The below average seasonal snowfall for the third season in a row certainly didn’t help the grade, but the excellent March pulled it up out of the D range.  I wouldn’t say it was an outrageously snowy March, since in just the eight seasons in my data set there are two with more snow than this past one, but the combination of snow, cold, and consistent temperatures below freezing this past March set up some excellent skiing.  For the pros and cons list, I just updated what I had in the list from my post from April 24^th, and added that below:

 

Pros

November snowfall above average (17.7”)

November 22 start of season snowpack

March snowfall above average (37.8”)

March temperatures below average

Highest # of accumulating storms at our site (58)

 

Cons

Frigid, dry, midwinter air

Season snowfall below average (142.9”)

December snowfall well below average (26.2”, -1.0 S.D., bottom 16%)

January snowfall extremely low (15.8”, -1.7 S.D., bottom 5%)

April snowfall below average (4.4”)

Snowpack (SDD) below average

No 40” storm cycles for the mountains

No 30” storm cycles for the mountains!?

No 18” storms at our site

January rain and ice

 

For reference, I’ve got our winter weather data table below; which compares this season (top row) to the past several:

 

[tamarack]

That low SDD is in major contrast to my area, where it was excellent. However, comparing your numbers to mine really illustrates the difference between foothills synoptic cement and N.VT fluff. Using only the past 7 years, to avoid any with snowfall but not SDD:

--Waterbury snowfall 07-08 thru 13-14 averages 66% more than New Sharon, 158.5" to 95.5".

--For SDDs, Waterbury records only 74% as much as NS, 1494 to 2011. Only in 2010-11, when Waterbury fell only 4" short of doubling my snowfall, did they have more SDDs, 2277 to 1740.

--For a made-up (by me) stat to estimate "retention ability", derived by dividing SDDs by snowfall, the differences are even higher: Waterbury 9.4, NS 21.0. By this stat, 2013-14 looks especially bad for VT, with their "R.A." at 9.3 while mine was 28.0, my highest ever - coldest of 16 winters helped that along.

[powderfreak]

Another Con that I left out (it was nearly erased from memory by Feb/Mar) was the abnormally high number of 2" or less "storms" that included many hours of snowfall at rates 0.1"/hr or less - I count 9 such events in Dec/Jan. The classic, of course, was the tortuously long graze from the Jan 2-3 cold storm, 2.1" in about 24 hr of continuous snowfall (noteworthy because temps ranged -8 to -12 thru the event.) Nickel and dime events this past winter were pennies and ha-pennies in my area.

lol that event was painful...like 2.5" of arctic sand after 24 hours of snow. The flakes were so small the visibility reduction made it look like fog.

[CoastalWx]

This may be a weenie thing to say...but despite that total....I didn't get that "satisfied" feeling that I should have felt with totals the way they were. Perhaps it was because of not quite getting a classic coastal, but 2010-2011 was able to give me that feeling with snow totals similar to this season. It could be the March we had as well....hopefully this makes sense to some..but it's something I've thought about. 2010-2011 also had an epic snowpack so that too might explain some.

[ORH_wxman]

This may be a weenie thing to say...but despite that total....I didn't get that "satisfied" feeling that I should have felt with totals the way they were. Perhaps it was because of not quite getting a classic coastal, but 2010-2011 was able to give me that feeling with snow totals similar to this season. It could be the March we had as well....hopefully this makes sense to some..but it's something I've thought about. 2010-2011 also had an epic snowpack so that too might explain some.

 

 

Coming off 2012-2013's big storms in the 2nd half of that winter, its easy to feel dissatisfied with mostly 5-10" snowfalls...and your one 17" fluff job that sublimated in half the next day. We probably would have felt more satisfied if this past winter came on the heels of 2011-2012 rather than the blockbuster Feb/Mar finish in 2013.

[powderfreak]

That low SDD is in major contrast to my area, where it was excellent. However, comparing your numbers to mine really illustrates the difference between foothills synoptic cement and N.VT fluff. Using only the past 7 years, to avoid any with snowfall but not SDD:

--Waterbury snowfall 07-08 thru 13-14 averages 66% more than New Sharon, 158.5" to 95.5".

--For SDDs, Waterbury records only 74% as much as NS, 1494 to 2011. Only in 2010-11, when Waterbury fell only 4" short of doubling my snowfall, did they have more SDDs, 2277 to 1740.

--For a made-up (by me) stat to estimate "retention ability", derived by dividing SDDs by snowfall, the differences are even higher: Waterbury 9.4, NS 21.0. By this stat, 2013-14 looks especially bad for VT, with their "R.A." at 9.3 while mine was 28.0, my highest ever - coldest of 16 winters helped that along.

The SDD's will be really skewed last year as we didn't retain snow over here nearly as well during January as you guys did. I remember some of those rain events in January it was like 34F at Dendrite to your location, while it was like 48F up here. I remember even the mountains like Sugarloaf were torching but the cold was really low level, like 1,000ft and lower along the foothills.

You guys built up a big snowpack early while we were still waiting for a warning criteria event, lol...I remember Allenson to Dendrite to ME foothills getting a few solid events break there way (one even where you guys got 6-10" while we got .3" rain). Then it was locked in with CAD and rain. Dendrite I know had a larger snowpack than me (by like a foot or two at times) all winter up until mid-March).

I know the fluff argument well, but honestly last winter we didn't really have much in the way of upslope so the fluff argument holds less weight this year. J.Spin and I both commented on that fact too...a lot of the snow was nickle and dime synoptic stuff. We just didn't retain it and as a general rule, the lower elevations around here won't hold snow nearly as well as in Maine. The east slopes of the Greens do and also Allenson's area up into NE VT, but most valley spots can get Champlain Valley warmth to eventually override and CAD.

[powderfreak]

This may be a weenie thing to say...but despite that total....I didn't get that "satisfied" feeling that I should have felt with totals the way they were. Perhaps it was because of not quite getting a classic coastal, but 2010-2011 was able to give me that feeling with snow totals similar to this season. It could be the March we had as well....hopefully this makes sense to some..but it's something I've thought about. 2010-2011 also had an epic snowpack so that too might explain some.

2010-2011 winter was awesome...I don't think I realized how good that was when it was occurring. We had 150.1" in town and a 40" snowpack in early March. At the time it felt like we were getting shafted by missing the core of the Jan blitz, but looking back, we had just consistent 40" months. No month was like really crappy compared to the others, just steady snowfall throughout.

[CoastalWx]

Coming off 2012-2013's big storms in the 2nd half of that winter, its easy to feel dissatisfied with mostly 5-10" snowfalls...and your one 17" fluff job that sublimated in half the next day. We probably would have felt more satisfied if this past winter came on the heels of 2011-2012 rather than the blockbuster Feb/Mar finish in 2013.

 

Yeah I mean obviously I have think objectively with how much snow fell relative to climo..etc and I should be happy. Don't get me wrong...I will take this winter in a heartbeat...but just never had that finishing touch where you can sit back, smoke a cigar and say it was an awesome winter. JMHO.

[CoastalWx]

2010-2011 winter was awesome...I don't think I realized how good that was when it was occurring. We had 150.1" in town and a 40" snowpack in early March. At the time it felt like we were getting shafted by missing the core of the Jan blitz, but looking back, we had just consistent 40" months. No month was like really crappy compared to the others, just steady snowfall throughout.

 

We had close to 3' even in the city. That's unheard of. The snowpack was quite impressive N and W of PYM and stayed that way for weeks. Major gradient right at PYM. You went from 20-30" to less than 8" in miles.

[ORH_wxman]

Yeah I mean obviously I have think objectively with how much snow fell relative to climo..etc and I should be happy. Don't get me wrong...I will take this winter in a heartbeat...but just never had that finishing touch where you can sit back, smoke a cigar and say it was an awesome winter. JMHO.

 

 

Well I def wouldn't rate it that high either...I only gave it a "B" in the grades anyway.

 

The As and A+s are when I'll break out the cigar, lol.

[CoastalWx]

Well I def wouldn't rate it that high either...I only gave it a "B" in the grades anyway.

 

The As and A+s are when I'll break out the cigar, lol.

 

I gave it a little higher grade for my area given how much fell..but I could make an argument for a B+ if I wanted to as well.

[powderfreak]

Well I def wouldn't rate it that high either...I only gave it a "B" in the grades anyway.

The As and A+s are when I'll break out the cigar, lol.

Yeah...A grade is like 2000-2001 up here or 2007-2008. For you guys it's probably 1995-1996 type stuff.

I think this past winter probably grades decrease from south to north...ie around Philly you almost have to go with A or A+ based on the record number of 6+ inch events. This was a type of winter that could get an A down there.

Then the grades drop to B area in SNE into CNE (southern VT and NH did well relative to climo

I think)...and C area for farther NNE where I think this was the only area in the Northeast with normal or below snowfall.

If C/C+ is given in an average year (as that's sort of an average grade in academics), then I bet the grades decrease with latitude starting around NJ northward...and probably decrease from NJ southward too, lol.

[dendrite]

Yeah...A grade is like 2000-2001 up here or 2007-2008. For you guys it's probably 1995-1996 type stuff.

I think this past winter probably grades decrease from south to north...ie around Philly you almost have to go with A or A+ based on the record number of 6+ inch events. This was a type of winter that could get an A down there.

Then the grades drop to B area in SNE into CNE (southern VT and NH did well relative to climo

I think)...and C area for farther NNE where I think this was the only area in the Northeast with normal or below snowfall.

If C/C+ is given in an average year (as that's sort of an average grade in academics), then I bet the grades decrease with latitude starting around NJ northward...and probably decrease from NJ southward too, lol.

I won't go below A- here. I just can't with 100" and well below normal temps for NDJFM.

The big events were 11.7" 12/14-15, 11.4" 1/2-3, 13.4" 2/13-14, and 12.6" on 2/18 which included that 3-5"/hr for a couple hours. The only negative here was really those rainers sandwiched between the arctic cold.

[tamarack]

 

2010-2011 winter was awesome...I don't think I realized how good that was when it was occurring. We had 150.1" in town and a 40" snowpack in early March. At the time it felt like we were getting shafted by missing the core of the Jan blitz, but looking back, we had just consistent 40" months. No month was like really crappy compared to the others, just steady snowfall throughout.

2010-11 was underwhelming here, despite sneaking over the century mark thanks to 15" on April Fools Day (all of which was gone 2 days later.) During that incredible - elsewhere - Boxing Day thru Jan stretch, we kept getting nice 7-8" events while 25 miles away had 15" (and sometimes it was 25 miles N,S,E,and W getting those larger dumps.) The exception waas the late Jan storm, which barely affected NNE. Then the huge March dump, which brought 19" to Eustis, was 2" of IP/ZR whose only memorable effect was my coming home at 8 PM to a cold and powerless house after a 14-hour day. My wife was house-sitting near BGR, the juice had been off since late morn, and the inside temp was maybe 45. (Also was suffering symptoms, like no balance and poor coordination, of the herniated disc and spinal stenosis that required fusion surgery 6 weeks later. All this colors that winter a muddy brown in my memory.)

[powderfreak]

I won't go below A- here. I just can't with 100" and well below normal temps for NDJFM.

The big events were 11.7" 12/14-15, 11.4" 1/2-3, 13.4" 2/13-14, and 12.6" on 2/18 which included that 3-5"/hr for a couple hours. The only negative here was really those rainers sandwiched between the arctic cold.

How often do you hit 100"? I noticed you and Allenson had the highest totals relative to normal...there was definitely a sweet spot axis there, and in January I remember you had a much better snowpack than even the White Mountains to your north, haha.

What was your depth on January 13th when the mountains were bare to the summits except for snowmaking?

[powderfreak]

2010-11 was underwhelming here, despite sneaking over the century mark thanks to 15" on April Fools Day (all of which was gone 2 days later.) During that incredible - elsewhere - Boxing Day thru Jan stretch, we kept getting nice 7-8" events while 25 miles away had 15" (and sometimes it was 25 miles N,S,E,and W getting those larger dumps.) The exception waas the late Jan storm, which barely affected NNE. Then the huge March dump, which brought 19" to Eustis, was 2" of IP/ZR whose only memorable effect was my coming home at 8 PM to a cold and powerless house after a 14-hour day. My wife was house-sitting near BGR, the juice had been off since late morn, and the inside temp was maybe 45. (Also was suffering symptoms, like no balance and poor coordination, of the herniated disc and spinal stenosis that required fusion surgery 6 weeks later. All this colors that winter a muddy brown in my memory.)

That's how our January went as well...those big SNE storms were 6-10" here. But it was steady and consistent...and the upslope was working with a couple notable events, including 15-30" in early December. The 27" on March 5-6 though really capped off the winter...that was the historic top 10 storm we had missed when SNE got bombed in January. Sounds like you just missed that one...I'm sure a two-footer in there would've helped during that time in your life.

[dendrite]

It wasn't great. Jan 13th was 10". We hung between 9-13" until the beginning of Feb. It was off to the races after that. I'll have to look up the local COOP data to get a feel for 100" frequency, but it's not that common. My avg is somewhere in the low 70s I believe.

[CoastalWx]

It wasn't great. Jan 13th was 10". We hung between 9-13" until the beginning of Feb. It was off to the races after that. I'll have to look up the local COOP data to get a feel for 100" frequency, but it's not that common. My avg is somewhere in the low 70s I believe.

 

I would have thought hi 70s.