Ginx snewx Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 39 minutes ago, J.Spin said: The latest BTV NWS forecast discussion does continue to mention the possibility with the back side of the this system, starting with a Winter Storm Watch for the Saint Lawrence Valley, but they’re starting to mention areas farther east, so they’ve certainly got their eyes on it. I'd say we’re south and east of the very best snows with this system, but most models show some snow in the area. We’ll see what the models suggest as we get closer. SHORT TERM /THURSDAY THROUGH FRIDAY/... As of 406 AM EST Wednesday...A very complexity and challenging fcst continues to unfold with some sizable changes noted in the 00z guidance. …have issued winter storm watch for 6 or more inches of snow and some ice accumulation for the St Lawrence Valley from 00z Friday thru 15z Friday. Additional headlines are possible for other parts of NY and portions of VT in later fcst packages. Excellent prospects for decent upslope with following clipper. Post frontal snows seem likely. Should be a nice cover up from the rain warmth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tamarack Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 1 hour ago, Ginx snewx said: Excellent prospects for decent upslope with following clipper. Post frontal snows seem likely. Should be a nice cover up from the rain warmth. Forecast for Estcourt Station: Thursday Night Snow. Low around 9. Wind chill values as low as -4. North wind 14 to 16 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New snow accumulation of 9 to 13 inches possible.Friday Snow before noon, then a chance of snow showers between noon and 2pm, then a slight chance of snow after 2pm. High near 12. Northwest wind 10 to 18 mph. Chance of precipitation is 80%. New snow accumulation of 1 to 2 inches possible. Meanwhile the other end of the state may be 50° milder on Thursday night, as February's rollercoaster ride continues. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jculligan Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 I'm heading down to Massachusetts this evening until Friday afternoon, then traveling back north to Jackson Friday evening. I have about two feet OTG in my yard right now, so it'll be interesting to see how much survives the inevitable torch. I'm hoping CAD saves the Mount Washington Valley for most of the day tomorrow, but I'm sure there will be at least a 12-hour period of rapid melt tomorrow night...especially at my 1500' elevation. Hopefully we only lose 6-8" but I get nervous when I see dewpoints nearing 50F in the forecast. We'll see. I hope the Greens really cash in with the post-frontal upslope on Friday and then the follow-up clipper system on Saturday. Planning to take the girlfriend and her 10-year-old son over to Stowe on Monday in search of better snow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 The HRRR looks brutal later Thursday night with the cold tucking down the Champlain valley. Wow. Might be one of those deals where it takes time to get over the spine. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alex Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 I feel like every time we get a warmup we talk about it like it's this crazy thing, while it seems to me to be climatology. I've never experienced a NNE winter when we don't have a major rain/melt event at least once if not multiple time through the season. Rinse, repeat... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 1 hour ago, CoastalWx said: The HRRR looks brutal later Thursday night with the cold tucking down the Champlain valley. Wow. Might be one of those deals where it takes time to get over the spine. Yeah its likely going to stall for an hour or two at the Spine. Sharp drops though, flash freeze. Might go to freezing rain instead of snow as aloft looks a tad behind the SFC cold. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 Ran some snow cores for NOAA ahead of the warmth. Low snowpack and low water equivalent. I’ve seen 20-24” of water in mid-Feb at 3000ft before. HIGH ROAD 3,015FT 38-42” and 8.0-11.0” SWE (9.0” MOST COMMON) BASE AREA (1,600FT) 22-24” and 6.5-7.5” SWE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 The BTV NWS has updated their advisories map in association with the upcoming system, so I’ve got that and the Event Total Snowfall map as well. I received a text indicating that we’ve been put under a Winter Weather Advisory, and that’s what covers much of the area aside from the Winter Storm Warning out in the Saint Lawrence Valley. The map has the spine of the Northern Greens in the 2-3” shading. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhineasC Posted February 16, 2022 Author Share Posted February 16, 2022 1 hour ago, powderfreak said: Ran some snow cores for NOAA ahead of the warmth. Low snowpack and low water equivalent. I’ve seen 20-24” of water in mid-Feb at 3000ft before. HIGH ROAD 3,015FT 38-42” and 8.0-11.0” SWE (9.0” MOST COMMON) BASE AREA (1,600FT) 22-24” and 6.5-7.5” SWE Is that a good thing or bad thing for retention with this rainstorm (the SWE I mean)? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 29 minutes ago, PhineasC said: Is that a good thing or bad thing for retention with this rainstorm (the SWE I mean)? It’s like 30% water at 1600ft and say 20-25% water at 3,000ft. There’s some room there but once it hits 40-50% water it is really “ripe” and melts fast as it can’t absorb H2O beyond that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhineasC Posted February 16, 2022 Author Share Posted February 16, 2022 3 hours ago, CoastalWx said: The HRRR looks brutal later Thursday night with the cold tucking down the Champlain valley. Wow. Might be one of those deals where it takes time to get over the spine. Cold fronts always take forever to get here in these events. Weenies in MD will be getting snow while I rot at 47 for hours and hours. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BuffaloWeather Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 21 hours ago, powderfreak said: Holy sh*t. A full burial and one partial burial in an avalanche in the Adirondacks back on Saturday. That's a big slide. Saturday February 12, 2022 a large (R4, D3) skier triggered avalanche occurred on the furthest lookers right slide path in the well known northeast facing Angel Slides area on the shoulder of Wright Peak. The slide appears to have been remotely triggered by two skiers ascending the slide path. The crown of the avalanche at ~3,750 feet in elevation is estimated to have been 80 cm (~2.5 ft) deep at the deepest point, and reached approximately 150 feet across the entirety of the slope. From the start zone it is estimated the avalanche traveled more than 1000 feet to the toe of the avalanche.By their own estimation the slide released approximately 500 feet above the two skiers. Both skiers were caught and carried around 150 feet. Skier one may have experienced a brief loss of consciousness, after coming to with a partially obstructed airway due to snow impacted in their mouth they were able to extract themselves from their partial burial after five minutes. Skier one located skier two with the lowest beacon reading being greater than one meter. Skier one dug out skier two who was fully buried and inverted, and had his airway cleared in approximately 10 to 15 minutes after the beginning of the incident. Skier two was not responsive and breathing faintly. As skier one continued to extract his partner, skier two regained consciousness. Both skiers recovered to the point that they were able to extract themselves from the woods despite the loss of some of their gear.On the same slope we observed a snowpack of 70 cm in depth. Our results in the snow pit were as follows; CT 15 Q1 @ 60cm (measuring from the top), ECTP 14 @ 60 cm.Read the full, unedited report on the observations page of our website via the link in our bio.Thanks to those involved for sharing the details of this incident with us. It is our hope that sharing this information will increase our community’s awareness of avalanche hazards and highlight the need for more education and information to help mitigate the risk of traveling in avalanche terrain in the Adirondacks. https://www.instagram.com/p/CaBSEC6OsJR/ I believe they were doing some off trail skiing? This isn't Whiteface? I've hiked Wright peak and there are no groomed trails around there. They must have been hiking up the mountain and skiing down some open areas with no trees. I'm heading up to the high peaks region to hike on Sunday, almost finished with the 46 hikes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhineasC Posted February 16, 2022 Author Share Posted February 16, 2022 3 hours ago, alex said: I feel like every time we get a warmup we talk about it like it's this crazy thing, while it seems to me to be climatology. I've never experienced a NNE winter when we don't have a major rain/melt event at least once if not multiple time through the season. Rinse, repeat... For a while it looked like there would be back-to-back nasty cutters but the second one dampened out and looks more like a mixed or snow event now. Our packs will survive this thing at the end of the week, but a second one soon after would have been tough. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted February 16, 2022 Share Posted February 16, 2022 5 minutes ago, BuffaloWeather said: I believe they were doing some off trail skiing? This isn't Whiteface? I've hiked Wright peak and there are no groomed trails around there. They must have been hiking up the mountain and skiing down some open areas with no trees. I'm heading up to the high peaks region to hike on Sunday, almost finished with the 46 hikes. Oh yeah, they were fully backcountry skiing. There are a lot of folks who do that in NNE. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greenmtnwx Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 Greetings from Big Sky, MT 9 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 3 hours ago, PhineasC said: For a while it looked like there would be back-to-back nasty cutters but the second one dampened out and looks more like a mixed or snow event now. Our packs will survive this thing at the end of the week, but a second one soon after would have been tough. As Alex mentioned above, people often make a bigger deal out of these events than is warranted. Because NNE is so wintry, there may be this perception that it’s sub-freezing with snow as the only type of precipitation from November through April, but of course we know that’s not actually the case. I’ll hear people use this term “cutter” seemingly for any system that appears to bring a storm’s warm sector… I guess to a specific location they’re concerned about or something? But it sounds like some sort of nonsensical term a weenie made up for dramatic effect. There are occasional storms that hit just right and have a dramatic effect on the snowpack, but that’s often in situations where the snowpack isn’t all that robust, or it’s some extended warm spell that goes on for days. Even way down here in the valley bottom at our site, the snowpack is quite hefty right now, with multiple inches of liquid equivalent as the NOHRSC plot shows below. And as PF’s recent analyses indicate, there’s three times that amount of liquid in the snowpack at elevation. You can see in the NOHRSC modeling for our site in the plot below that this upcoming system really isn’t expected to have a dramatic effect on the snowpack. The snowpack, especially the mountains, could probably handle more of these if that’s what happened to transpire, but of course it’s far better for the snowpack and snow sports overall if more of the systems come as snow, or at least mostly frozen. The snowpack can only hold so much water and will eventually get “ripe” as PF mentioned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhineasC Posted February 17, 2022 Author Share Posted February 17, 2022 My pack is at 22" now and I expect to be around 12" at the end of this. Maybe more if tail-end snow materializes. I'm never too confident on that until it happens. A meltdown followed by a flash freeze will make the natural trails pretty crappy around here for a while. This thing is bringing about 12 hours of solid dews and rain; it's not just a 34 degree drizzle fest the pack can shrug off. Luckily the copycat storm for next week the models had for a while dampened out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bwt3650 Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 The pack can probably handle it, but the timing is crap for the mountains. I was at Stowe today and the surface is “un-good”. Add in rain to flash freeze and president weekend crowds (I would think it brings out some less experienced people also) and pf and staff are going to have their hands full. What I noticed today was not that it was unskiable, but stopping or slowing is obviously much more difficult and with crowded slopes and people stopping in the middle of narrow sections, it’s a recipe for crashes. Def give credit to their ops though for trying to put together a surface with the garbage thaw/freeze. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 6 hours ago, bwt3650 said: The pack can probably handle it, but the timing is crap for the mountains. I was at Stowe today and the surface is “un-good”. Add in rain to flash freeze and president weekend crowds (I would think it brings out some less experienced people also) and pf and staff are going to have their hands full. What I noticed today was not that it was unskiable, but stopping or slowing is obviously much more difficult and with crowded slopes and people stopping in the middle of narrow sections, it’s a recipe for crashes. Def give credit to their ops though for trying to put together a surface with the garbage thaw/freeze. I took one run and did the snow/water survey after that and then went home, haha. I'm so over firm and fast conditions this time of year. In November or December, sure but not week long stretches of it in mid-February. I'll find something else to do. No patience for it in February/March/April. May not ski for a good solid week after this next one unless it snows a little . To illustrate how solid the ungroomed snow is, this guy snapped his ski in half on a mogul. It's a Stockli Stormrider! Those things are solid skis but no match for frozen moguls right now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zeepowderhunter Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 14 minutes ago, powderfreak said: I took one run and did the snow/water survey after that and then went home, haha. I'm so over firm and fast conditions this time of year. In November or December, sure but not week long stretches of it in mid-February. I'll find something else to do. No patience for it in February/March/April. May not ski for a good solid week after this next one unless it snows a little . To illustrate how solid the ungroomed snow is, this guy snapped his ski in half on a mogul. It's a Stockli Stormrider! Those things are solid skis but no match for frozen moguls right now. Is that thing snapped under foot? It is a stout ski….no noodle there! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhineasC Posted February 17, 2022 Author Share Posted February 17, 2022 1 hour ago, powderfreak said: I took one run and did the snow/water survey after that and then went home, haha. I'm so over firm and fast conditions this time of year. In November or December, sure but not week long stretches of it in mid-February. I'll find something else to do. No patience for it in February/March/April. May not ski for a good solid week after this next one unless it snows a little . To illustrate how solid the ungroomed snow is, this guy snapped his ski in half on a mogul. It's a Stockli Stormrider! Those things are solid skis but no match for frozen moguls right now. Couldn’t ride out this storm, I guess. LOL 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ginx snewx Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 You guys are due for an upslope bonanza and some meat storms. Pretty confident that you all will be still shoveling while the next one approaches. Busy pattern with multiple chances. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mreaves Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 43 minutes ago, Ginx snewx said: You guys are due for an upslope bonanza and some meat storms. Pretty confident that you all will be still shoveling while the next one approaches. Busy pattern with multiple chances. In my twisted mind, this is just Mother Nature making sure we have room for the snow she is going to bury us with later. I can hope, can't I? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tamarack Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 20 hours ago, alex said: I feel like every time we get a warmup we talk about it like it's this crazy thing, while it seems to me to be climatology. I've never experienced a NNE winter when we don't have a major rain/melt event at least once if not multiple time through the season. Rinse, repeat... Only in Fort Kent did we approach wall-to-wall winters. 76-77 was probably the closest, with a thaw in early November thru some sunny 50s in the 2nd week of March. There was a snow-to-rain event on 12/7 but the temp topped out at 37 with a net gain in depth, so not much of a speed bump. Five years later there was a mild (+7.6°) December with rain on 6-7, but that was followed by 40"+ snow by the 31st. The final week of March had two 50+ days but little precip and winter returned big time in April. At our present locale, even a two-month run of pure winter is uncommon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wxeyeNH Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 1230pm 55/42F Looks like that is it for the sun. My pack is just so glaciated. Even with 18 more hours of warmth and dews I wonder how much I will be able to melt? About 6" left in south facing slopes, more in woods. For the last week a bunch of deer are just yarded up in the woods behind the house. Very hard for them to walk around with this type of snow. I hope I can melt enough off so some bare spots appear. Let them get some grazing in before it gets covered up again next week. (You can see one of my snowstakes down near the fence. Wide angle lens makes it appear crocked but it is not Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bwt3650 Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 4 hours ago, Ginx snewx said: You guys are due for an upslope bonanza and some meat storms. Pretty confident that you all will be still shoveling while the next one approaches. Busy pattern with multiple chances. Man, I hope you’re right. That’s what’s been missing this year; those constant “fixer” upslope snows. Yesterday was the first time in a while, where I didn’t crave that one more run. I did 5 or 6 runs and then was like “why”. The mountains with less crowds are the place to be right now where the grooming holds up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhineasC Posted February 17, 2022 Author Share Posted February 17, 2022 2 minutes ago, bwt3650 said: Man, I hope you’re right. That’s what’s been missing this year; those constant “fixer” upslope snows. Yesterday was the first time in a while, where I didn’t crave that one more run. I did 5 or 6 runs and then was like “why”. The mountains with less crowds are the place to be right now where the grooming holds up. Upslope has been noticeably missing this season. J. Spin still seems to get his tenths every couple days, but where are the 3-5 jobs? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ginx snewx Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 1 hour ago, tamarack said: Only in Fort Kent did we approach wall-to-wall winters. 76-77 was probably the closest, with a thaw in early November thru some sunny 50s in the 2nd week of March. There was a snow-to-rain event on 12/7 but the temp topped out at 37 with a net gain in depth, so not much of a speed bump. Five years later there was a mild (+7.6°) December with rain on 6-7, but that was followed by 40"+ snow by the 31st. The final week of March had two 50+ days but little precip and winter returned big time in April. At our present locale, even a two-month run of pure winter is uncommon. 02/03 was wall to wall in NNE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 19 minutes ago, PhineasC said: Upslope has been noticeably missing this season. J. Spin still seems to get his tenths every couple days, but where are the 3-5 jobs? The number of 1" snowfalls in the mountain snow tally is pretty crazy. Some year's those are always 3-5"... and you have three of them in 7-day stretches. We keep ending up with like 2-3" totals "for the past 7 days" a lot this winter. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted February 17, 2022 Share Posted February 17, 2022 23 minutes ago, bwt3650 said: Man, I hope you’re right. That’s what’s been missing this year; those constant “fixer” upslope snows. Yesterday was the first time in a while, where I didn’t crave that one more run. I did 5 or 6 runs and then was like “why”. The mountains with less crowds are the place to be right now where the grooming holds up. And flatter terrain so it's not getting scraped off... need mellow terrain, tons of grooming, and light crowds right now. We are delaying opening until 10am tomorrow. I just updated Stowe.com/Snow with our plans for the morning. No sugarcoating there, ha. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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