CoastalWx Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 10 hours ago, J.Spin said: LOL, from what I’ve seen on the forum those guys down there apparently love their big storms with big winds, but I also hear them griping about the issues with snowfall measurement, so I was just trying to think of a word to describe that environment. LOL, well I hope you didn’t take my post as an insult in anyway. I was just wondering about the difference. And yes as a meteorologist, I enjoy my big winds too, and everything else about a good storm. Hopefully driftville will live up to its name soon enough. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 8 hours ago, CoastalWx said: LOL, well I hope you didn’t take my post as an insult in anyway. I was just wondering about the difference. And yes as a meteorologist, I enjoy my big winds too, and everything else about a good storm. Hopefully driftville will live up to its name soon enough. Definitely no offense taken – discussing the data and collection methodologies is one of the great parts of this forum. I typically expand my posts to explain things in a bit more depth because I want to pass along my experience with others on here that might be measuring snow – compared to how simple it is to measure liquid precipitation, it’s actually amazing how much more complicated and variable snow measurement turns out to be. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 Event totals: 5.9” Snow/0.26” L.E. The clouds are starting to clear out now, so the totals above should be the final values at our site for this storm. Details from the 6:00 A.M. Waterbury observations: New Snow: 0.4 inches New Liquid: 0.01 inches Snow/Water Ratio: 40.0 Snow Density: 2.5% H2O Temperature: 27.1 F Sky: Mostly Cloudy Snow at the stake: 12.0 inches Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 22 hours ago, dryslot said: May have to stay huddled up in here over the next 10 days or so...................... 22 hours ago, mreaves said: We will be forced to with this epic revenge winter we have been having. The thing is though, I swear I’ve seen posts from some folks in SNE mentioning that they’ve only seen five (or was it maybe even as low as three?) below average snowfall winters this century? That’s amazing if it’s real. I’m sure someone has the real numbers, but if those sorts of numbers are true, there have to be corrections at some point. At our site (reasonably representative of the spine of the Northern Greens) we’re doing fine on snowfall thanks to that big November, but due to December being a bit on the slow side, the current season total is nothing outrageous. As of this most recent storm, we’re about a foot ahead of average snowfall pace, but that represents a S.D. value of +0.64, so well within ±1 S.D. Right now we’re actually 20 to 30 inches behind seasons like 2007-2008 and 2008-2009, which were killing it with great Novembers and Decembers and were nearing 100 inches of snowfall at this point. From what I’ve seen so far in my data set, those winters kind of set the standard for great early season runs. Going forward though, this season will certainly be holding its own if we were to have a good January. I just looked at my data and it’s been eight years since we’ve had a reasonably strong January in terms of snowfall at our site (January 2011 with 55.5”), but we’ll just have to see how this one plays out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dryslot Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 Just now, J.Spin said: The thing is though, I swear I’ve seen posts from some folks in SNE mentioning that they’ve only seen five (or was it maybe even as low as three?) below average snowfall winters this century? That’s amazing if it’s real. I’m sure someone has the real numbers, but if those sorts of numbers are true, there have to be corrections at some point. At our site (reasonably representative of the spine of the Northern Greens) we’re doing fine on snowfall thanks to that big November, but due to December being a bit on the slow side, the current season total is nothing outrageous. As of this most recent storm, we’re about a foot ahead of average snowfall pace, but that represents a S.D. value of +0.64, so well within ±1 S.D. Right now we’re actually 20 to 30 inches behind seasons like 2007-2008 and 2008-2009, which were killing it with great Novembers and Decembers and were nearing 100 inches of snowfall at this point. From what I’ve seen so far in my data set, those winters kind of set the standard for great early season runs. Going forward though, this season will certainly be holding its own if we were to have a good January. I just looked at my data and it’s been eight years since we’ve had a reasonably strong January in terms of snowfall at our site (January 2011 with 55.5”), but we’ll just have to see how this one plays out. It looks to stay quite active, And we are getting into our highest climo time of winter coming up, I think right now, We're in a better position having the gradient just far enough south that we stay frozen unless we get some of these southern streamers that come along without any phasing from the northern stream go up the St Lawrence, Right now, It seems the Northern stream is going to get more active which in turn bodes well for CNE/NNE case in point, The tues (8th) system, Its tough to miss out on snow when these move right over you from west to east. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tamarack Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 49 minutes ago, J.Spin said: The thing is though, I swear I’ve seen posts from some folks in SNE mentioning that they’ve only seen five (or was it maybe even as low as three?) below average snowfall winters this century? That’s amazing if it’s real. I’m sure someone has the real numbers, but if those sorts of numbers are true, there have to be corrections at some point. At our site (reasonably representative of the spine of the Northern Greens) we’re doing fine on snowfall thanks to that big November, but due to December being a bit on the slow side, the current season total is nothing outrageous. As of this most recent storm, we’re about a foot ahead of average snowfall pace, but that represents a S.D. value of +0.64, so well within ±1 S.D. Right now we’re actually 20 to 30 inches behind seasons like 2007-2008 and 2008-2009, which were killing it with great Novembers and Decembers and were nearing 100 inches of snowfall at this point. From what I’ve seen so far in my data set, those winters kind of set the standard for great early season runs. Going forward though, this season will certainly be holding its own if we were to have a good January. I just looked at my data and it’s been eight years since we’ve had a reasonably strong January in terms of snowfall at our site (January 2011 with 55.5”), but we’ll just have to see how this one plays out. A bit more balanced here compared to my average. Starting with 99-00, there have been 8 BN winters, all at least 15" BN, one (12-13) almost dead on average, and 10 AN. That's why the median is 2" higher than the average. And with yesterday's 2.8" of fluff, also that rare (for this season) all-snow event, we've nickeled and dimed our way to 40", a foot above my YTD average. How January will finish is unknown, but it took only 3 days to pass December's weak total. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LongBeachSurfFreak Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 Any thoughts on tomorrow’s event up high? I’m hoping to stay frozen above 2k. Mid level issues in southern Vermont? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 15 minutes ago, LongBeachSurfFreak said: Any thoughts on tomorrow’s event up high? I’m hoping to stay frozen above 2k. Mid level issues in southern Vermont? I haven’t been paying much attention to the southern stream system because it seemed pretty marginal and warm in VT (that’s not a classic combination for great results), and the BTV NWS isn’t expecting any significant impacts per their recent discussion. I guess it depends on how far south in the state you’re thinking, but VT really seems to be on the fringe of any effects. AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION National Weather Service Burlington VT 940 AM EST Fri Jan 4 2019 .NEAR TERM /THROUGH SATURDAY/...As of 940 AM EST Friday...Southern stream system - currently over the Arklatex region early this AM - passes eastward off the mid-atlantic coast and south of New England on Saturday. May see just the northern fringe of associated stratiform precipitation across s-central VT, with conditional probability of IP/ZR/R mix across Rutland/Windsor counties Saturday afternoon for a few hrs. With PoPs only 20-40%, not expecting any significant impacts, and temperatures once again generally warm above freezing with highs mainly mid-upr 30s. The northern stream system on Saturday night into Sunday seems to have more potential up north. The BTV NWS forecast discussion just mentions an inch or two at this point, but with the way it looks on some of the models, and what we know about what the Greens can do with even these smaller systems, I’d think that the mountains have potential for a bit more than that. I’m sure the BTV NWS will talk more about it as more runs of the short term models come in and it if potential is there, and I’m sure PF will talk about it here or on Braatencast if he sees some potential: .SHORT TERM /SATURDAY NIGHT THROUGH SUNDAY/...As of 305 AM EST Friday...A northern stream shortwave at the base of an amplifying trough will push through the northeastern United States Saturday night. Positive vorticity advection associated with the feature and favorable upper-level jet placement will provide enough deep lift to support some snow showers overnight in the North Country. Despite the favorable dynamics however, deep moisture will be limited. At this point, looking like the best chances for an inch or two of snow will be over the northwestern Adirondacks and northwestern Green Mountains in the overnight to morning hours. Snow showers will taper off during the afternoon Sunday as the better forcing moves east of the area. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
backedgeapproaching Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 48 minutes ago, LongBeachSurfFreak said: Any thoughts on tomorrow’s event up high? I’m hoping to stay frozen above 2k. Mid level issues in southern Vermont? I dont know, look to be on the fringe of any meaningful QPF, and even then mid levels seem to warm--850s look pretty toasty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 2 hours ago, tamarack said: A bit more balanced here compared to my average. Starting with 99-00, there have been 8 BN winters, all at least 15" BN, one (12-13) almost dead on average, and 10 AN. That's why the median is 2" higher than the average. And with yesterday's 2.8" of fluff, also that rare (for this season) all-snow event, we've nickeled and dimed our way to 40", a foot above my YTD average. How January will finish is unknown, but it took only 3 days to pass December's weak total. I didn’t do any comparisons to my data because I really don’t have a long term average to compare to here (the official BTV site is definitely not a great representation of here along the spine), and with only 12 seasons in my data set, I’m essentially creating the average. So not surprisingly, my seasons break down roughly 50/50 above/below with respect to the snowfall average. We did have what were clearly five below average seasons in a row from ’11-‘12 to ’15-‘16 (highest annual total during that stretch was only 144.7”), with ‘09-‘10 clearly below average and ‘06-‘07 potentially a bit below average, so that’s seven seasons that are probably below average right there, with another six seasons out there from this century for which I don’t have data. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tamarack Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 1 hour ago, J.Spin said: I didn’t do any comparisons to my data because I really don’t have a long term average to compare to here (the official BTV site is definitely not a great representation of here along the spine), and with only 12 seasons in my data set, I’m essentially creating the average. So not surprisingly, my seasons break down roughly 50/50 above/below with respect to the snowfall average. We did have what were clearly five below average seasons in a row from ’11-‘12 to ’15-‘16 (highest annual total during that stretch was only 144.7”), with ‘09-‘10 clearly below average and ‘06-‘07 potentially a bit below average, so that’s seven seasons that are probably below average right there, with another six seasons out there from this century for which I don’t have data. Since my data at our current location goes back only thru May 17, 1998, I'm also creating the average - with formulas in place, every time I enter data the averages are re-computed. Just for grins, here are my BN winters: 98-99 (a 9th BN, but pre-century), 99-00, 01-02, 02-03, 03-04, 05-06, 09-10, 11-12, 15-16. 2012-13 is the "almost dead on" - with data included up thru last month, my average winter is now 90.33" and 12-13 had 90.4. A snowy January and that winter could drop to BN. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 This is a bit intriguing. Decent dynamics aloft and upslope flow with cold air advection. The 18z GFS came in pretty decent for a light snow event on Sunday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lava Rock Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 This is a bit intriguing. Decent dynamics aloft and upslope flow with cold air advection. The 18z GFS came in pretty decent for a light snow event on Sunday. Lol, you'll get 6"Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
#NoPoles Posted January 4, 2019 Share Posted January 4, 2019 Next week looks like winter returns up here, 2 storms within 36hrs? Maybe I will be Liking so many posts, I run out of Likes again Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 As I’m watching TWC this morning, Dr. Postel was discussing next week’s potential winter storm in the NNY/NNE area. While he was pointing out the expected importance of elevation with the event, he used a 3-D graphic they’ve prepared for the discussion that zooms in on the Champlain Valley from the south and shows the spine of the Northern Greens in relief. It was very much like graphics we’ve used here in discussions to give a sense for the ~4,000’ difference in elevation between BTV and the higher ridgelines. Anyway, it was interesting to see one of the concepts we often discuss in here covered at the national level. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wxmanmitch Posted January 5, 2019 Author Share Posted January 5, 2019 33° F and rain at 2,230' elevation from a coastal in early January. Has this ever happened before? Maybe someone can go check the scrolls... Sure, it's rained plenty of times here in January from cutters, but it's *HOW* we're getting this rain that's disturbing. What a disaster!!! Completely dumbfounded... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LongBeachSurfFreak Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 12 minutes ago, wxmanmitch said: 33° F and rain at 2,230' elevation from a coastal in early January. Has this ever happened before? Maybe someone can go check the scrolls... Sure, it's rained plenty of times here in January from cutters, but it's *HOW* we're getting this rain that's disturbing. What a disaster!!! Completely dumbfounded... It’s raining and 35 at the top of Stratton. I had 33 and rain at the house too. But I did see cars covered in ice in the lot. So it’s below freezing somewhere. This is awful 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
backedgeapproaching Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 1 hour ago, wxmanmitch said: 33° F and rain at 2,230' elevation from a coastal in early January. Has this ever happened before? Maybe someone can go check the scrolls... Sure, it's rained plenty of times here in January from cutters, but it's *HOW* we're getting this rain that's disturbing. What a disaster!!! Completely dumbfounded... Solid melt mitch Pretty crazy, usually a coastal transversing under LI is a decent track, but not today.. Only had about 4" in DEC here. Still along ways to go for winter weather..especially for your location Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 The EURO went a little Wild with tomorrow's upslope snow. 3-6" refresh for the ski areas? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 4 minutes ago, powderfreak said: The EURO went a little Wild with tomorrow's upslope snow. 3-6" refresh for the ski areas? Yeah, that certainly seems reasonable. The point forecast here is roughly 2-4” through Sunday night, so at elevation that wouldn’t be surprising at all. Just about every model shows precipitation in the 0.2” to 0.4” range along the spine up here, so there’s a lot of support, and the BTV NWS discussion suggests SLRs will be in the 15 to 20:1 range. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wxeyeNH Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Enjoy your upslope tomorrow. I'll get my usual handful of flurry leftovers. I can never catchup to you guys in snow amounts with your upslope. Mid 30's today. A few ice pellets earlier as the storm to the SE passed by. Snowy week coming up? Looked like big potential a few days ago but now not very much. Several inches? Maybe the 2nd system (which now looks like its almost one continous light snow event?) can get going in the GOM to give Central NH some decent snow. Hired people to chainsaw apple limbs and we carted 5 truckloads of branches to our towns burn pile, plus 1 pickup full of apple cord wood. Pastures back to looking decent except for bent birches which will be dealt with this spring. With my SW expsure to the horizen, I am noticing the sun setting further north now. 2-3 more weeks and climatologically we start warming. Hope the SNE guys get some snow. Different world 75 miles south. Chow... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
borderwx Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Saw a 39F on our way to Burke. It was an especially good 5th day of January. Let’s go snow, got it all our sharp edge turns for the week today! she was showing off tonight 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wxeyeNH Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Such a great sunset over a wide area of C/NNE tonight. Clear skies to the west with the storm passing by to the SE. These are my favorite setups for sunsets, when the sun is actually below the horizon and shinning up on the undersides of the clouds. Caught it from my lawn. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alex Posted January 6, 2019 Share Posted January 6, 2019 4 hours ago, wxeyeNH said: Enjoy your upslope tomorrow. I'll get my usual handful of flurry leftovers. I can never catchup to you guys in snow amounts with your upslope. Mid 30's today. A few ice pellets earlier as the storm to the SE passed by. Snowy week coming up? Looked like big potential a few days ago but now not very much. Several inches? Maybe the 2nd system (which now looks like its almost one continous light snow event?) can get going in the GOM to give Central NH some decent snow. Hired people to chainsaw apple limbs and we carted 5 truckloads of branches to our towns burn pile, plus 1 pickup full of apple cord wood. Pastures back to looking decent except for bent birches which will be dealt with this spring. With my SW expsure to the horizen, I am noticing the sun setting further north now. 2-3 more weeks and climatologically we start warming. Hope the SNE guys get some snow. Different world 75 miles south. Chow... Very different. Interacted with multiple group of renters who were really surprised to see how much snow there is, and said they weren't expecting to find any! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted January 6, 2019 Share Posted January 6, 2019 6 hours ago, J.Spin said: Yeah, that certainly seems reasonable. The point forecast here is roughly 2-4” through Sunday night, so at elevation that wouldn’t be surprising at all. Just about every model shows precipitation in the 0.2” to 0.4” range along the spine up here, so there’s a lot of support, and the BTV NWS discussion suggests SLRs will be in the 15 to 20:1 range. I'm intrigued as we are in HRRR range and that model is sort of going nuts. Very blocked flow to begin with early in the morning tomorrow could get snow all the way back into Burlington... then becomes unblocked as the day goes on. But these are some decent QPF from the normally reserved HRRR. If ratios are there, this could be decent for the ski resorts. I've noticed models have been zeroing in on Bolton as the ground zero spot. They could clean up there with blocked flow on the west slope. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mreaves Posted January 6, 2019 Share Posted January 6, 2019 1 hour ago, alex said: Very different. Interacted with multiple group of renters who were really surprised to see how much snow there is, and said they weren't expecting to find any! That really shows the validity of the old adage about a foot of snow in the big cities is just about as good for tourism businesses up here as snow falling here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted January 6, 2019 Share Posted January 6, 2019 1 hour ago, powderfreak said: I'm intrigued as we are in HRRR range and that model is sort of going nuts. Very blocked flow to begin with early in the morning tomorrow could get snow all the way back into Burlington... then becomes unblocked as the day goes on. But these are some decent QPF from the normally reserved HRRR. If ratios are there, this could be decent for the ski resorts. I've noticed models have been zeroing in on Bolton as the ground zero spot. They could clean up there with blocked flow on the west slope. Yeah, I took a look at the HRRR and could see some of that blocked flow look. Since around 10:00 P.M. we’ve been having flakes here as the first pulses of moisture appear to be moving into the area: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted January 6, 2019 Share Posted January 6, 2019 1 hour ago, powderfreak said: But these are some decent QPF from the normally reserved HRRR. If ratios are there, this could be decent for the ski resorts. I've noticed models have been zeroing in on Bolton as the ground zero spot. They could clean up there with blocked flow on the west slope. That was a good look for them, so it’s going to be nice to see how it plays out. The only part of the resort that really needs touching up are a few of the natural Timberline trails down around 1,500’ – 2,000’. I was on that part of the mountain for a tour on Thursday, and could see that those spots will need just a bit more snow to be able to support left-served levels of skier traffic. I was up at the main mountain today, and I was very impressed with how the skiing has come along in the past couple of days. The new snow has settled some and it’s now had a chance to form a much better bond to the underlying surface. In addition, there’s definitely been some additional liquid equivalent added to the surface snow relative to what I found earlier in the week thanks to the additional snow we’ve gotten. We found that even black diamond pitches were skiing nicely with all the new snow, and even when you got down to the base it wasn’t overly firm at all. Today’s temperatures up around the freezing mark were likely helping with the softening as well. In the weather department today it was really nice - the sky was a mix of sun and clouds when we got up there in the late morning period, and temperatures were just edging above freezing at the 2,000’ level. The freezing level was climbing up in elevation, but the powder in the higher elevations was definitely staying nice into the afternoon. A few pictures from today’s outing: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
#NoPoles Posted January 6, 2019 Share Posted January 6, 2019 Burlington Free Press rporting Jay is being put up for sale...I assume that means Burke Mtn will also be put up for sale. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted January 6, 2019 Share Posted January 6, 2019 It is dumping this morning at the ski resorts. West slope getting crushed too. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now