Killllington 🎿🏂🏂🎿🎿🏂🏂🎿😀

[cdskier]

I was amazed how well it looked like it held up on the webcams this weekend. Today on the other hand it looks like it is disappearing by the minute.

 

[deadheadskier]

I was amazed how well it looked like it held up on the webcams this weekend. Today on the other hand it looks like it is disappearing by the minute.

Yeah. Thursday was the right call. I bet they won't be able to offer 75% of the trail by the weekend with the forecast. Until reading your post, I hadn't looked since yesterday and you're totally right. Significant carnage.

 

[joshua segal]

Yeah. Thursday was the right call. I bet they won't be able to offer 75% of the trail by the weekend with the forecast. Until reading your post, I hadn't looked since yesterday and you're totally right. Significant carnage.

I have been a lone holdout that they should go through the weekend. With rain forecast at 60% and higher for both Friday and Saturday; and with a look at the webcam this AM, I am finally in agreement that June 1 is the right decision. However, Sunday's weather (June 4) looks great and conditions should be more typical of Killington's final day of the season!

 

[deadheadskier]

I have been a lone holdout that they should go through the weekend. With rain forecast at 60% and higher for both Friday and Saturday; and with a look at the webcam this AM, I am finally in agreement that June 1 is the right decision. However, Sunday's weather (June 4) looks great and conditions should be more typical of Killington's final day of the season!

We can revisit this post on Sunday if they have the webcam on, but I don't think your optimism meshes with reality. I don't see how you look at the images this morning with the next three days having day/night temps of 85/56, 88/63 & 86/53 and draw a conclusion that Sunday is possible. What's left is going to get absolutely torched. I may have been being generous in stating the potential is there to have 75% of the trail still skiable this weekend. 50% might be more likely.

Yes, I've skied Killington in June with hiking down the full head wall, gaps in the middle and a long walk to the lift. I doubt there's even that available come Sunday.

The reality is they have blown away expectations making it to even 6/1. In April, people doubted any skiing past Mothers Day. They got very lucky with cold nights to make it this far. People should be thrilled with 6/1 and end it then on a high note.

Hope those who make it tomorrow have a great time

 

[drjeff]

We can revisit this post on Sunday if they have the webcam on, but I don't think your optimism meshes with reality. I don't see how you look at the images this morning with the next three days having day/night temps of 85/56, 88/63 & 86/53 and draw a conclusion that Sunday is possible. What's left is going to get absolutely torched. I may have been being generous in stating the potential is there to have 75% of the trail still skiable this weekend. 50% might be more likely.

Yes, I've skied Killington in June with hiking down the full head wall, gaps in the middle and a long walk to the lift. I doubt there's even that available come Sunday.

The reality is they have blown away expectations making it to even 6/1. In April, people doubted any skiing past Mothers Day. They got very lucky with cold nights to make it this far. People should be thrilled with 6/1 and end it then on a high note.

Hope those who make it tomorrow have a great time

Agree with your assessment DHS. Even though there was some cool/"cold" air in Southern New England this morning (my car thermometer in NE CT this morning on my way to wrk just after 7 was in the 43-45 range, it's warmer aloft up North right now. Between the Mount Washington Observatory calling for high summit temps in the mid 60's the next few days with lows in the upper 40's and then checking the summit thermomter web cam for Mount Snow just now at about 9AM and it was reading 63 degrees already at about 3600ft, the snowpack on Superstar is going to take a hit until the front passes sometime Friday evening.

Guessing also the mtn ops at K, with their snow sat depth data combined with the forecast, know that they're just about out of snow to push around to keep it more white than brown, and unfortunately as has been seen many times over, when Superstar gets close to the end, it can go very quickly from looking like it has good coverage to more walking than slding on snow.

Kudos to K for making it to June 1st. Not too many were giving that a chance a few weeks ago. The combo of a cooperative mother nature with generally cooler (especially at night) temps and not too much rain this last month, combined with some great snow farming efforts will pull off another June closing for them

 

[Newpylong]

I have been a lone holdout that they should go through the weekend. With rain forecast at 60% and higher for both Friday and Saturday; and with a look at the webcam this AM, I am finally in agreement that June 1 is the right decision. However, Sunday's weather (June 4) looks great and conditions should be more typical of Killington's final day of the season!

Tomorrow IS going to be typical closing day conditions. This weekend? Not gonna be anything but a couple bands left. We can revisit then but you'll see.

 

[joshua segal]

Tomorrow IS going to be typical closing day conditions. This weekend? Not gonna be anything but a couple bands left. We can revisit then but you'll see.

View attachment 58559

You realize that is almost exactly the way it looked last week before they groomed for the weekend? You may be right about tomorrow, but Killington is saying T2B. If so, it will look about like this on Sunday, with a few bigger bare spots. I assume you remember what they skied on closing day last year? It was a lot less than this.

 

[cdskier]

You realize that is almost exactly the way it looked last week before they groomed for the weekend? You may be right about tomorrow, but Killington is saying T2B. If so, it will look about like this on Sunday, with a few bigger bare spots. I assume you remember what they skied on closing day last year? It was a lot less than this.

So you're saying this from last week is the same as what it looks like on the cam right now? You might need some glasses if so...

 

[deadheadskier]

You realize that is almost exactly the way it looked last week before they groomed for the weekend? You may be right about tomorrow, but Killington is saying T2B. If so, it will look about like this on Sunday, with a few bigger bare spots. I assume you remember what they skied on closing day last year? It was a lot less than this.

This post will not age well. 3 days of 80+ weather is gonna vaporize most of what they have left.

 

[cdskier]

This post will not age well. 3 days of 80+ weather is gonna vaporize most of what they have left.

Let's also not forget that even if it did "look" similar to last week at this time (which it doesn't), they still moved a ton of snow around last week to make it good for the weekend. They're now running out of spots to move snow FROM so it isn't like they can do exactly what they did last week again.

 

[drjeff]

You realize that is almost exactly the way it looked last week before they groomed for the weekend? You may be right about tomorrow, but Killington is saying T2B. If so, it will look about like this on Sunday, with a few bigger bare spots. I assume you remember what they skied on closing day last year? It was a lot less than this.

The biggest difference between last week and this week is all of the farming they did last week to get it as covered as it was, leaves them with far less snow to work with/farm this week, let alone the loss of the insulating factor that feet of snow has over say a foot of snow has down near that base ice, and it's warmer right now than it was a week ago.

I will gladly eat my words in a few days if needed.

Tomorrow they'll spin the llft. Possibly on Friday if mother nature under performs temps wise (1 in 10), highly unlikley on Saturday (1 in 50). Similar odds on Sunday of winning a hundreds of billions of dollars powerball jackpot is my hunch

 

[joshua segal]

I too will gladly eat my words in a few days if needed. I haven’t rubbed your noses in it yet for your quotes that “it won’t last till Mother’s Day“ call.

I think we will generally agree that Memorial Day's skiing was the best in years. Why are you insisting on taking the pessimist line?

 

[RH29]

I read a comment on Liftblog saying "Bad news – the carriers on the Snowdon Triple are in need of replacement. However, Doppelmayr and Leitner-Poma want nothing to do with it." - Does anyone know more about this?

 

[deadheadskier]

I too will gladly eat my words in a few days if needed. I haven’t rubbed your noses in it yet for your quotes that “it won’t last till Mother’s Day“ call.

I think we will generally agree that Memorial Day's skiing was the best in years. Why are you insisting on taking the pessimist line?

Realism, not pessimism.

I don't think anyone in this thread wants to see K close any sooner than realistically possible. Tomorrow is that day based upon current available snow and forecast.

If the weekend was realistically attainable, the mountain would have 100% not opened tomorrow and waited until Saturday or Sunday when there would be a much higher turnout.

 

[joshua segal]

Realism, not pessimism.

I don't think anyone in this thread wants to see K close any sooner than realistically possible. Tomorrow is that day based upon current available snow and forecast.

If the weekend was realistically attainable, the mountain would have 100% not opened tomorrow and waited until Saturday or Sunday when there would be a much higher turnout.

Not realism: Just your opinion. IMO, Killington has run lifts in the late spring with far less snow than we will see on Sunday. Given the current forecast for Friday/Saturday, Thursday is the right decision. Opening Sunday was never an option put out by Killington.

DrJeff suggested that if the over/under for bare patches on Sunday were 7, he would take the over. I would take the under expecting 5 places where either turfing or walking will be necessary. deadheadskier: Can I assume that you would take the over?

 

[deadheadskier]

Not realism: Just your opinion. IMO, Killington has run lifts in the late spring with far less snow than we will see on Sunday. Given the current forecast for Friday/Saturday, Thursday is the right decision. Opening Sunday was never an option put out by Killington.

DrJeff suggested that if the over/under for bare patches on Sunday were 7, he would take the over. I would take the under expecting 5 places where either turfing or walking will be necessary. deadheadskier: Can I assume that you would take the over?

This is silly. I'm not going to get into arguments over the number of bare patches. I'll just say that about 50% or less of the trail will be skiable by Sunday. It will be as bad as or worse than the "worst" years they've spun a lift on the final day with little snow. I know what it's like Josh. I've skied Killington in June on both Superstar and Cascade plenty of times. They have no incentive to do it having already made the June goal.

I think you are under estimating just how bad the impact of three straight days of 80+ degrees in June sun will be on that snowpack.

 

[joshua segal]

This is silly. I'm not going to get into arguments over the number of bare patches. I'll just say that about 50% or less of the trail will be skiable by Sunday. It will be as bad as or worse than the "worst" years they've spun a lift on the final day with little snow. I know what it's like Josh. I've skied Killington in June on both Superstar and Cascade plenty of times. They have no incentive to do it having already made the June goal.

I think you are under estimating just how bad the impact of three straight days of 80+ degrees in June sun will be on that snowpack.

Why are you calling it an argument? Do you not bet on sporting events? As far as experience at Killington goes, I'll be happy to go head-to-head with you. I've been skiing there since the 67-68 season.

You think "I am underestimating just how bad the impact of three straight days of 80+ degrees" is. I think you are underestimating how long it takes for the glacial ice that is SS to melt out.

Presumably they had no incentive to ski until mid-June in the 1990s, but they did. The mantra was, "we'll ski until you quit" and "when the rest of the world is green, Killington will still be white." Let's see what the webcam shows on Sunday morning.

 

[deadheadskier]

Ok. I won't call it an argument. I think your "bet" is silly. I'll say it again. Maybe 50% the length of the trail will be skiable on Sunday. Maybe

What they did in the 90s is irrelevant. And great that you've been skiing K since well before I was born. Who cares? I was only stating that I was making my commentary from a position of experience skiing there in June and not just internet observation

 

[machski]

The biggest difference between last week and this week is all of the farming they did last week to get it as covered as it was, leaves them with far less snow to work with/farm this week, let alone the loss of the insulating factor that feet of snow has over say a foot of snow has down near that base ice, and it's warmer right now than it was a week ago.

I will gladly eat my words in a few days if needed.

Tomorrow they'll spin the llft. Possibly on Friday if mother nature under performs temps wise (1 in 10), highly unlikley on Saturday (1 in 50). Similar odds on Sunday of winning a hundreds of billions of dollars powerball jackpot is my hunch

The biggest difference in my mind is the rift at the top of Preston's actually opened up this week. It surprised me it had not by the end of last week. That is normally the death nail of SS. Once that tears across, the trail usually goes pretty quick. Add to the issue this week vs last is that they had low nightime temps last week, firming the snow and letting the cats really be able to work overnight and into the am. Tonight they will have mush overnight to try and push around on without tearing through to dirt. And they really have not had any good temps all week up on the hill to work with in this regard. Congrats to K for getting this far, huge hand to mother nature as well.

 

[Keelhauled]

Let's see what the webcam shows on Sunday morning.

It's gonna show a lot of green...