CoastalWx Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 A lot of the warmth is simply due to sunny days and no rain. Mays usually come with some rainy and wet days. With all the dry days, departures have been running warm. with strong May sun boosting temps. I've have cooler temps with 850 temps near 20C and cloudy days, compared to sunny days with 850 temps of +4. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 A lot of the warmth is simply due to sunny days and no rain. Mays usually come with some rainy and wet days. With all the dry days, departures have been running warm. with strong May sun boosting temps. I've have cooler temps with 850 temps near 20C and cloudy days, compared to sunny days with 850 temps of +4. Yeah, this time of year, sunshine usually means above normal, while rain and clouds mean below normal. Even with chilly air masses aloft, if it's full sun it can be hard to get real negative departures. Likewise it's tough to get very positive departures on cloudy days. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nittany88 Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 12Z MEX was 19F at SLK. Ha yeah wouldn't surprise me, they were 23F in the last cool shot last week. That place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eyewall Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 Kp is 6 tonight which is good enough for aurora and unfortunately it is cloudy. I ended up with this instead of the lights: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 Damn. That's sweet Eyewall. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
klw Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 It looks like a nice line of storms is crossing the Lake into VT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mreaves Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 It looks like a nice line of storms is crossing the Lake into VT Warned in Franklin and Grand Isle SEVERE WEATHER STATEMENT NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BURLINGTON VT 228 PM EDT TUE MAY 19 2015 VTC011-013-191900- /O.CON.KBTV.SV.W.0003.000000T0000Z-150519T1900Z/ GRAND ISLE VT-FRANKLIN VT- 228 PM EDT TUE MAY 19 2015 ...A SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL 300 PM EDT FOR NORTHERN GRAND ISLE AND NORTHWESTERN FRANKLIN COUNTIES... AT 227 PM EDT...DOPPLER RADAR INDICATED A SEVERE THUNDERSTORM CAPABLE OF PRODUCING DAMAGING WINDS IN EXCESS OF 60 MPH. THIS STORM WAS LOCATED OVER SOUTH ALBURGH...MOVING NORTHEAST AT 40 MPH. NICKEL SIZE HAIL MAY ALSO ACCOMPANY THE DAMAGING WINDS. IN ADDITION...AT 223 PM PEA SIZE HAIL WAS REPORTED IN WEST CHAZY NEW YORK. LOCATIONS IMPACTED INCLUDE... FRANKLIN...SHELDON...BERKSHIRE...NORTH HERO...ISLE LA MOTTE...ALBURGH DUNES STATE PARK...LAKE CARMI STATE PARK...HIGHGATE FALLS... ALBURGH...SOUTH ALBURGH...BOW ARROW POINT...KNIGHT POINT...HOG ISLAND...GANDER BAY...SCOTT POINT...ALBURGH CENTER...MARTINDALE POINT...FISK POINT...GOOSE POINT AND BULL RUSH POINT. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS... BOATERS ON LAKE CHAMPLAIN SHOULD SEEK SAFE HARBOR NOW! STRONG WINDS WILL CAUSE HIGHER WAVES AND SUDDEN WIND SHIFTS MAY OVERTURN BOATS. SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS PRODUCE DAMAGING WINDS...DESTRUCTIVE HAIL... DEADLY LIGHTNING AND VERY HEAVY RAIN. FOR YOUR PROTECTION MOVE TO AN INTERIOR ROOM ON THE LOWEST FLOOR OF YOUR HOME OR BUSINESS. HEAVY RAINS FLOOD ROADS QUICKLY SO DO NOT DRIVE INTO AREAS WHERE WATER COVERS THE ROAD. IN ADDITION TO LARGE HAIL AND DAMAGING WINDS...CONTINUOUS CLOUD TO GROUND LIGHTNING IS OCCURRING WITH THIS STORM. MOVE INDOORS IMMEDIATELY. LIGHTNING IS ONE OF NATURES LEADING KILLERS. REMEMBER... IF YOU CAN HEAR THUNDER...YOU ARE CLOSE ENOUGH TO BE STRUCK BY LIGHTNING. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eyewall Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 I tried to chase toward Vergennes but the line started collapsing south. Saw some lightning and heavy rain but no hail/wind. I was hoping for a shelfie but no luck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isotherm Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 Looks like Mansfield is down to 12" depth. Incredible they still have snow on the ground. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 Looks like Mansfield is down to 12" depth. Incredible they still have snow on the ground. Those high elevation evergreen forests can really hold snow like no ones business, especially when trying to melt 80+ inches on the ground in April. I can still see snow from home though when looking up at the mountain...but that's the remnant snowmaking snow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wxeyeNH Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 T storms a miss. Grand total from this AM .14". Next chance next week? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eyewall Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 Here are a few shots I took of today's storms. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nittany88 Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 Looks like Mansfield is down to 12" depth. Incredible they still have snow on the ground. Right about normal or so: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nzucker Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Right about normal or so: They're probably going to melt out a bit early, though...I doubt they make it to the average melt date of 6/7-6/8...been too warm and sunny this May. Powder, what's the latest Mansfield has held snowpack? Late June? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 They're probably going to melt out a bit early, though...I doubt they make it to the average melt date of 6/7-6/8...been too warm and sunny this May. Powder, what's the latest Mansfield has held snowpack? Late June? I'm not sure but it would probably be spring 1997 when there was 4 feet on the ground on June 1st. To be honest, I know it's "average" melt date is in early June, I personally haven't seen it get that far since I've been up here I don't think. It's almost always in the last two weeks of May. I've been meaning to look at the hard data to see how many years actually get to early June. I think it may be a case where the median is late May but a couple big years have skewed the mean to be later in the season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
klw Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Looks like there might be a bit of snow on the spine of the Greens at the moment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tamarack Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 I'm not sure but it would probably be spring 1997 when there was 4 feet on the ground on June 1st. To be honest, I know it's "average" melt date is in early June, I personally haven't seen it get that far since I've been up here I don't think. It's almost always in the last two weeks of May. I've been meaning to look at the hard data to see how many years actually get to early June. I think it may be a case where the median is late May but a couple big years have skewed the mean to be later in the season. Quick look at my Mansfield numbers shows that 1997 appears to be the latest, with the last day of measurable on 6/11. Next is 1967 with 6/9, then 1969 (their deepest snowpack at 149", coming in early April) on 6/7. I haven't tried to fully compare last dates, but at the 3,950-ft mark, it would appear that 1/3 or less of the years have snowpack into June, that the mean and median are likely both in late May. Their peak depth in 1997 was a slightly-above-avg 82". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Quick look at my Mansfield numbers shows that 1997 appears to be the latest, with the last day of measurable on 6/11. Next is 1967 with 6/9, then 1969 (their deepest snowpack at 149", coming in early April) on 6/7. I haven't tried to fully compare last dates, but at the 3,950-ft mark, it would appear that 1/3 or less of the years have snowpack into June, that the mean and median are likely both in late May. Their peak depth in 1997 was a slightly-above-avg 82".See that's been my experience as well, but the graph that shows the average depth definitely goes into early June. There's a disconnect there. It's always been my ancedotal opinion that average melt out is the second half of May. Not the first week of June.31F up there right now, so snow preservation today. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Looks like there might be a bit of snow on the spine of the Greens at the moment. I could feel the cooler air starting to come into the area yesterday afternoon, and indeed, the temperature is below freezing even down at 3,950’ on Mt. Mansfield, so presumably there’s some sort of frozen precipitation. Mt Washington is 24.6 F and reporting sleet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 See that's been my experience as well, but the graph that shows the average depth definitely goes into early June. There's a disconnect there. It's always been my ancedotal opinion that average melt out is the second half of May. Not the first week of June. I think I recall us talking about this before – didn’t we bring up the possibility that it’s just late-season snow events potentially making that mean snowpack tail the way it is? For example, we had that Memorial Day snowstorm from two years ago. The stake depth jumped to a half foot and hung around for a few days after the snowpack had already gone to zero a few days earlier. If you scatter a bunch of events like that into late May and early June over the record of only ~60 years, you can essentially get that tail created. Comparing the mean and median snowpack for those last couple of weeks of the snowpack season should get at it. For example, the mean is what is shown on the plot in green, but I bet the median snowpack for a lot of those later dates is zero. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 I think I recall us talking about this before – didn’t we bring up the possibility that it’s just late-season snow events potentially making that mean snowpack tail the way it is? For example, we had that Memorial Day snowstorm from two years ago. The stake depth jumped to a half foot and hung around for a few days after the snowpack had already gone to zero a few days earlier. If you scatter a bunch of events like that into late May and early June over the record of only ~60 years, you can essentially get that tail created. Comparing the mean and median snowpack for those last couple of weeks of the snowpack season should get at it. For example, the mean is what is shown on the plot in green, but I bet the median snowpack for a lot of those later dates is zero. Yeah but now I'm not even sure its that... compare the zoomed in view of the average melt out based on the green line on the skivt-l graph. It looks like it melts out after June 7th on this. Compare with this, which is all years on record.... there is absolutely no way the average could possibly be June 7-8th, could it? Either way, from anecdotal experience and the clustering, I'd say its safe to say the last week of May seems to be the hot zone. I just find it hard to believe the data would even support a mean of T-2" as far as June 8th. Can like 3-4 years actually impact a 60 year data set that much? I guess the main take-away is that when it melts out in late May, I'm not sure I'd say its happening "ahead of schedule". I hear it even at the ski resort when folks quote that early June as the "average" melt out. That seems to imply there are an equal amount of years where it goes beyond early June, which it doesn't. If June 11th is the last date of measurable (as Tamarack pointed out), there's no way one can say that the end of the first week of June is the average, can they? I'd say May 20th to June 1st would be considered average. It would be interesting to see what 1 SD would be. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Anyway, here's a photo from that 1997 spring... when there was 48" of depth at the stake on May 31st. Can you imagine if right now there was still 5-6 feet up there now on May 20th? Melting down to 4 feet at the end of the month?! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Awesomely late spring...man, 70 inch depths in mid-May. 1997 is definitely the benchmark for spring snow pack. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
backedgeapproaching Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Awesomely late spring...man, 70 inch depths in mid-May. 1997 is definitely the benchmark for spring snow pack. gendateplot.php3.png Pretty incredible stuff. So it went from 48" to 0" in just 7-8 days? Looks like complete melt-out on June 7th-8th in 97 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Pretty incredible stuff. So it went from 48" to 0" in just 7-8 days? Looks like complete melt-out on June 7th-8th. Yeah... I'm sure the pattern may have flipped a bit or something and gone warm. There really is a limit to how long snow could possibly be on the ground at that time of year. It could've gone to a week of humid 60 degree dew points or something. Also dealing with convective heavy rains, high sun angle, etc. When it does go, it goes fast, as evident by the sharp drop in graph at the end of the season. Just falls off a cliff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LongBeachSurfFreak Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Yeah... I'm sure the pattern may have flipped a bit or something and gone warm. There really is a limit to how long snow could possibly be on the ground at that time of year. It could've gone to a week of humid 60 degree dew points or something. Also dealing with convective heavy rains, high sun angle, etc. When it does go, it goes fast, as evident by the sharp drop in graph at the end of the season. Just falls off a cliff. Shouldn't there be even more snow at the true summit? I always wondered why the obs aren't from all the way up. Also why the resort stops way down from the summit Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 I’ve got a spreadsheet of the Mt. Mansfield snowpack data from SkiVT-L, so I used it to create a table that could be helpful to the conversation: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Shouldn't there be even more snow at the true summit? I always wondered why the obs aren't from all the way up. Also why the resort stops way down from the summit The summit is wind-swept rock. You'd never be able to get a decent uniform depth. It'd be 20 feet deep behind a rock outcropping, and 0 inches on top of that rock outcropping. Its like serious drifting...from no snow to tens of feet of snow in the gullies. Even being down in the Spruce zone isn't completely ideal. Also the rocky summit ridge melts out fast due to the sun on the rocks. Those rocks warm up and the snow on the rocks can melt in March with a bunch of sunny mild days. Its like trying to get snow to stay on your driveway in full sun (there's no shade up there) after March 15th. If you hiked the mountain in the last month, you'd notice the snowpack would peak in the 500ft zone from like 3,400-3,900ft. Spruce forests are very effective at holding snow. As far as the resort going to the summit...if you are familiar with the terrain, it just wouldn't be feasible as there are some substantial cliffy areas and its just really too steep for the average skier. Even the Gondola as it is now can be a little steep off the top for your standard intermediate that's used to blue squares at say Stratton. This is also completely ignoring the environmental concerns on the ridgeline, and the fact that the lifts would never run due to wind hold. The prevailing westerly winds would just crush any chairlift trying to crest the ridge from the east. It would have to be a surface lift if it went up there. The set-up is fun for locals and tourists because it gives Mansfield the best and most accessible backcountry and sidecountry skiing in the East. The amount of terrain you can get to off the Quad and Gondola is amazing, especially with a 15-20 minute hike. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tamarack Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 June 1-12, 1997: 1....55....46....47" 2....59....44....46" 3....59....43....39" 4....59....42....35" 5....59....40....33" 6....61....39....27" 7....60....45....24" 8....57....43....20" 9....63....47....14" 10...66...51....12" 11...66...52....10" 12...64...54.....T Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
backedgeapproaching Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 June 1-12, 1997: 1....55....46....47" 2....59....44....46" 3....59....43....39" 4....59....42....35" 5....59....40....33" 6....61....39....27" 7....60....45....24" 8....57....43....20" 9....63....47....14" 10...66...51....12" 11...66...52....10" 12...64...54.....T So that graph was a little deceiving. Took 12 days for complete melt-out instead of 7-8. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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