NNE Warm Season Thread 2021

[#NoPoles]

Last year, we had a freeze the very beginning of September and with the drought, the combo created peak foliage season that lasted around 3 or 4 days at the most. Peak was around Sept 24-26. If went fast and on the earlier side. Omni didn't get their Gondola open in time for peak. This year, no freeze yet, and things are moving so much slower. Colors are definitely on the way, though.

[backedgeapproaching]

Definitely noticing some subtle changing down here.  Some of those purple-ish hues and a smattering of faint reds.

[alex]

Really hard to show changes in iPhone pictures but they're definitely changing. Plus the occasional tree that says - screw you all, I'm going for it. 

[powderfreak]

Posted in the severe thread as it evolved, but here are some obs for posterity in the NNE thread.

After a cloudy morning with a few rounds of showers, not much QPF in the early cells but the one that hit in the 2-3pm hour was wild.

Best wind/rain combo of the summer.  A few trees down and plenty of branch/leaf debris.  Always nice to have a front row seat to the mountain weather, and the velocity data suggested a pulse that moved SW to NE through the area, looked to squeeze just south of the Mansfield Chin (looks like it ran through the Nose to the south where the COOP station is).

 

 

The Mansfield Summit free-air wind readings on the Nose (~4,000ft) ramped up real fast.

Check out that 5 minute increase. 

2:10pm it's gusting near 30mph, and then 2:15pm reading is gusting near 80mph.  There's the downburst.

[wxeyeNH]

.23"  yesterday with weakening thunderstorms and light rain in the evening.  

Over the last year it has been a tale of two cities, well regions.  Very wet in SNE and very dry in NNE.  In my region of CNE  the past year would be way, way below average if not for the 11" in July.

Below is the % above or below average for the past 365 days.

[alex]

4 hours ago, wxeyeNH said:

.23"  yesterday with weakening thunderstorms and light rain in the evening.  

Over the last year it has been a tale of two cities, well regions.  Very wet in SNE and very dry in NNE.  In my region of CNE  the past year would be way, way below average if not for the 11" in July.

Below is the % above or below average for the past 365 days.

Central NH does not seem "way way below average" in that map 

[wxeyeNH]

23 hours ago, alex said:

Central NH does not seem "way way below average" in that map 

Alex,  I am around 80% of average for the past year.  So if I get 45" that is around 9" below.  Of that, 11" was in July and lots of that was quick runoff so I have to take some of that away too.  I don't know how unusual 20% more or less of yearly precipitation is?  Maybe some one with more knowledge of New England precip can chime in?

It seems over the past several years I am constantly whining about lack of qpf.  Even last winter except the big Dec 12th storm I didn't have a snowfall more than 4 or 5".  

2.25" so far this month with another dry week coming up.  Okay, rant ova!

[alex]

12 minutes ago, wxeyeNH said:

Alex,  I am around 80% of average for the past year.  So if I get 45" that is around 9" below.  Of that, 11" was in July and lots of that was quick runoff so I have to take some of that away too.  I don't know how unusual 20% more or less of yearly precipitation is?  Maybe some one with more knowledge of New England precip can chime in?

It seems over the past several years I am constantly whining about lack of qpf.  Even last winter except the big Dec 12th storm I didn't have a snowfall more than 4 or 5".  

2.25" so far this month with another dry week coming up.  Okay, rant ova!

It’s all relative, I suppose. To me it’s more about the sensible consequences of weather. If it rains 3” or 6” in a month it’s fairly inconsequential from an every day perspective. Now when vegetation starts wilting and wells are running dry, it’s another story!  in terms of standard deviations, I’m not sure how much variability there is year to year, but if I were to guess I’d imagine 80% of normal is not particularly unusual. But that’s completely not data based, I have no idea!

[powderfreak]

2 hours ago, wxeyeNH said:

Alex,  I am around 80% of average for the past year.  So if I get 45" that is around 9" below.  Of that, 11" was in July and lots of that was quick runoff so I have to take some of that away too. 

Not to nitpick Gene, but why do you need to take away any rain that runs off quickly? That’s all built into summer climo.  You’ve (we’ve) always had short duration intense convective rains in the summer since the dawn of time.  It counts just as much.

No where in the annual precip of New England does it say short duration heavy rains need to be removed… the annual precipitation totals build plenty of that in.

I’ve always found that reasoning odd but it’s not just you, it does come up around here in the forums a lot in summer… when folks are like I got X inches of rain this past month but most of it doesn’t really count because it fell quickly and ran off.  I know its a reference to not feeling like the vegetation got watered, but the vegetation has been dealing with convective rains for centuries here.

[CoastalWx]

Random question. Does a place like Whiteface in the Dacks avg similar to Mt Mansfield? Is it snowier or not?

[Baroclinic Zone]

4 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

Random question. Does a place like Whiteface in the Dacks avg similar to Mt Mansfield? Is it snowier or not?

https://www.onthesnow.com/new-york/whiteface-mountain-resort/historical-snowfall.html
https://www.onthesnow.com/vermont/stowe-mountain-resort/historical-snowfall.html

 

stowe averages about 50” more over the last decade based upon this data.

[CoastalWx]

20 minutes ago, Baroclinic Zone said:

https://www.onthesnow.com/new-york/whiteface-mountain-resort/historical-snowfall.html
https://www.onthesnow.com/vermont/stowe-mountain-resort/historical-snowfall.html

 

stowe averages about 50” more over the last decade based upon this data.

That looks off a bit....or maybe off a year? Like in 15-16 they did not have that much snow. That looks more for 16-17 when they had a great year.

[J.Spin]

On 9/16/2021 at 12:44 PM, wxeyeNH said:

.23"  yesterday with weakening thunderstorms and light rain in the evening.  

Over the last year it has been a tale of two cities, well regions.  Very wet in SNE and very dry in NNE.  In my region of CNE  the past year would be way, way below average if not for the 11" in July.

Below is the % above or below average for the past 365 days.

 

On 9/16/2021 at 4:45 PM, alex said:

Central NH does not seem "way way below average" in that map 

I checked my CoCoRaHS numbers and found 50.46” of liquid for the 365-day period.  That’s less than 10% below average, and seems very consistent with what the map shows for our area.

[tamarack]

Thru June precip here 2021 was 8.7" BN and 62% of average.  Thru yesterday we're 5.4" BN and 84% of average.  Gaining . . .

[alex]

25 minutes ago, J.Spin said:

 

I checked my CoCoRaHS numbers and found 50.46” of liquid for the 365-day period.  That’s less than 10% below average, and seems very consistent with what the map shows for our area.

That makes sense. Funny thing is, it actually felt like a wet summer all in all. The NEK, especially northern sections, seems to be much drier though

[tamarack]

3 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

That looks off a bit....or maybe off a year? Like in 15-16 they did not have that much snow. That looks more for 16-17 when they had a great year.

Looks like each year on that table should be one year later than shown, thus including 20-21.

[backedgeapproaching]

5 hours ago, J.Spin said:

 

I checked my CoCoRaHS numbers and found 50.46” of liquid for the 365-day period.  That’s less than 10% below average, and seems very consistent with what the map shows for our area.

Looks like I'm at 59.67" which is prob a bit above average and there is a little sliver of green near my station which seems about right too.  Mitch is over 70". No one is within 10" precip wise.  Obviously its been a little wetter overall in the southern part of the state as the map illustrates. 

[LaGrangewx]

12 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

Random question. Does a place like Whiteface in the Dacks avg similar to Mt Mansfield? Is it snowier or not?

I’ll chime in and say I’m confident Whiteface does not average the same as Stowe. They cash in a few times with decent lake effect but Stowe is almost always getting snow as well when they do. Stowe is better with the uplsope and is positioned better for many of the coastal storms. I think an interesting question is what do the core high peaks around Mount Marcy above 4-5000’ average. I think that could be much closer as I think that area does a bit better than the whiteface basin. 

[PhineasC]

I only have two summers under my belt, but this one certainly felt a lot different to me than last summer. It has seemed to be pretty wet and there were even some spells of what seemed like upslope rain from time to time where it would be raining pretty well at my place and just drizzle down in Gorham.

I haven't checked the CoCoRaHS numbers too closely but I'm sure we are running close enough to average. My well has been in great shape too.

It has seemed a lot less hot and humid than last summer too. Never really even got near 90 at my spot. Hit upper 80s briefly one time.

[powderfreak]

On 9/18/2021 at 8:00 AM, CoastalWx said:

Random question. Does a place like Whiteface in the Dacks avg similar to Mt Mansfield? Is it snowier or not?

I'm trying not to be a homer, and I have no real direct observations between the two.  My first season pass was to Whiteface/Gore back in high school, moved to the VT side during college and never went back for skiing.  It feels snowier in VT, though the 'Dacks are cold and hold snowpack very well.

The weird posit is that there is a sweet spot elevation zone in NNE mountains that the true high peaks may be too exposed to capitalize?  The Adirondacks and Whites have far more above treeline terrain than the minor amount in the Greens on Mansfield.  More wind, turbulence that causing less than ideal crystals too?  Higher snowfall in the areas surrounding the big terrain, definitely less mixed.

I do think the Northern Greens are better in NW flow upslope (those conditions exist mostly during strong NE tracking storms) and are further east for coastal synoptic events.  That's why this area over through Alex and Phin's area is so snowy.  The best overlap of orographic snows and synoptic snows.  Some years feature differing amounts of SE vs NW flow events, more mesoscale precip versus larger scale synoptic SE-E flow off the ocean.

The overlapping zones do the best statistically over the course of the winter season.

[powderfreak]

Pretty cool we are getting towards that time of the year… warm lake waters and cold air above them:

NEAR TERM /THROUGH MONDAY/... As of 710 AM EDT Sunday...Only minor changes to the forecast based on latest observations. Increased cloud cover locally over Burlington and south into Addison County as a lake band has developed downstream of Lake Champlain this morning. Based on NAM3 sounding profiles, temperatures aloft at ~1500ft are around 10C and latest lake ob shows water temps of 68F. This give a delta around 18 degree supporting the development of this cloud. As daytime heating commences the temperature difference should lessen therefore expect this cloud to dissipate within a couple hours.

[Patriot21]

Was cooler this morning than I expected it was gonna be. Headed out to try and get rid of a wasp nest around 5:30 and it was 39, that coupled with wet sneakers from the dew felt a little chilly.

[LaGrangewx]

1 hour ago, powderfreak said:

Pretty cool we are getting towards that time of the year… warm lake waters and cold air above them:

NEAR TERM /THROUGH MONDAY/... As of 710 AM EDT Sunday...Only minor changes to the forecast based on latest observations. Increased cloud cover locally over Burlington and south into Addison County as a lake band has developed downstream of Lake Champlain this morning. Based on NAM3 sounding profiles, temperatures aloft at ~1500ft are around 10C and latest lake ob shows water temps of 68F. This give a delta around 18 degree supporting the development of this cloud. As daytime heating commences the temperature difference should lessen therefore expect this cloud to dissipate within a couple hours.

 

14 hours ago, powderfreak said:

I'm trying not to be a homer, and I have no real direct observations between the two.  My first season pass was to Whiteface/Gore back in high school, moved to the VT side during college and never went back for skiing.  It feels snowier, though the 'Dacks are cold and hold snowpack very well.

The weird posit is that there is a sweet spot elevation zone in NNE mountains that the true high peaks may be too exposed to capitalize?  The Adirondacks and Whites have far more above treeline terrain than the minor amount in the Greens on Mansfield.  More wind, turbulence that causing less than ideal crystals too?  Higher snowfall in the areas surrounding the big terrain, definitely less mixed.

I do think the Northern Greens are better in NW flow upslope (those conditions exist mostly during strong NE tracking storms) and are further east for coastal synoptic events.  That's why this area over through Alex and Phin's area is so snowy.  The best overlap of orographic snows and synoptic snows.  Some years feature differing amounts of SE vs NW flow events, more mesoscale precip versus larger scale synoptic SE-E flow off the ocean.

The overlapping zones do the best statistically over the course of the winter season.

For what it’s worth hermit lake plot has average 200+ inches I think at like 3900’ over the past 3-4 seasons and I don’t think they’ve even had 1 average winter so who knows up at 5000+. Like you said wind could be a huge factor. I think they had 175 or so counting October and November last year in a pretty abysmal winter for that zone. The early and late season snow really tallies up there. April 2020 was huge there I think. 

[wxeyeNH]

Fantastic day today.  So far this fall my low has only been 48F.   A year ago right now I had several nights of mid 30's which really got the colors going.   Peak foliage was occurring in Alex's area on Sept 27th.  It was a very quick, vibrant peak.  Here is a drone video of Bretton Woods and Alex's Moose Lodge on that day.  

 

[powderfreak]

It only happens around the equinoxes, but twice a year the sun angle lines up to cast Mount Mansfield's shadow on the Sterling ridge.  The Chin and the Adams Apple profiles are the most prominent.

[bwt3650]

1 hour ago, powderfreak said:

It only happens around the equinoxes, but twice a year the sun angle lines up to cast Mount Mansfield's shadow on the Sterling ridge.  The Chin and the Adams Apple profiles are the most prominent.

very cool shot..so is that the back of madonna and sterling at smuggs?

[Patriot21]

Was there any talk of possible frost chances last night? Had a couple plants that looked and felt like they had frost on them. Maybe they were right on the verge of frost or a light frost, if that is a term.

[wxeyeNH]

28 minutes ago, Patriot21 said:

Was there any talk of possible frost chances last night? Had a couple plants that looked and felt like they had frost on them. Maybe they were right on the verge of frost or a light frost, if that is a term.

I think Northern Maine had a frost advisory

[wxeyeNH]

No northern New England animal really bothers me except these guys.  One tried to attack me years ago.

I do have to say that last night "was a marvelous night for a moon dance"  Their singing is a bit off however

 

https://video.nest.com/clip/99ae314d86ba4318a81dd9b55bd1e83a.mp4

[CoastalWx]

43 minutes ago, wxeyeNH said:

No northern New England animal really bothers me except these guys.  One tried to attack me years ago.

I do have to say that last night "was a marvelous night for a moon dance"  Their singing is a bit off however

 

https://video.nest.com/clip/99ae314d86ba4318a81dd9b55bd1e83a.mp4

They are all over the place down here.