Rain on Friday......Grrrrrr

[fbrissette]

Do yourself a favor, unbookmark that page, and never go there for your winter weather forecast ever again.

I find them to be excellent for temperature and wind - for Jay Peak at least. Not so great for precipitation however.

 

[BenedictGomez]

Hearing this blowtorch wrecked Stratton pretty good, down to bare spots in some places apparently.

 

[cdskier]

I'm all ears for better forecast sites... I like that they try to show elevation and it shows actual mountain weather as opposed to like Weather Underground or Weather.gov which uses the closest weather station.

If you're interested in mountain forecasts, NWS has enhanced forecasts for a number of mountains:
http://www.weather.gov/btv/mountain

More general winter maps and forecasts from NWS are here for VT:
http://www.weather.gov/btv/winter

One of the big problems with that other site you mentioned is that they don't account at all for any precipitation type other than snow and rain. So with a storm like this where you're getting mixing, that will impact snow totals a lot.

 

[BenedictGomez]

I find them to be excellent for temperature and wind - for Jay Peak at least. Not so great for precipitation however.

Any website can give you temp and wind. But that pcp is ridiculous, completely based on just automation of the model, which could tell someone they're getting 20" of snow, when in reality they're getting 0" of snow because it digests ANY "non-rain" pcp as snow. For instance, Wildcat is not getting 16" of snow from this event as they suggest, they'd be happy to get 6" from what we currently know. That's seriously misleading to people, and I bet there will be unhappy people who book hotels & ruin weekends based on "Fake News" so to speak.

 

[Jcb890]

If you're interested in mountain forecasts, NWS has enhanced forecasts for a number of mountains:
http://www.weather.gov/btv/mountain

More general winter maps and forecasts from NWS are here for VT:
http://www.weather.gov/btv/winter

One of the big problems with that other site you mentioned is that they don't account at all for any precipitation type other than snow and rain. So with a storm like this where you're getting mixing, that will impact snow totals a lot.

I find the weather.gov mountain forecasts link not very intuitive or easy to use.

Any website can give you temp and wind. But that pcp is ridiculous, completely based on just automation of the model, which could tell someone they're getting 20" of snow, when in reality they're getting 0" of snow because it digests ANY "non-rain" pcp as snow. For instance, Wildcat is not getting 16" of snow from this event as they suggest, they'd be happy to get 6" from what we currently know. That's seriously misleading to people, and I bet there will be unhappy people who book hotels & ruin weekends based on "Fake News" so to speak.

Good info, thank you. I need to get better at this apparently...

 

[BenedictGomez]

Good info, thank you. I need to get better at this apparently...

If a storm occurs where it's cold long before, all during, and right after, their projections will likely be correct, because all the air columns up to space are probably < 32 degrees. The problem is an event like this one, where it's below freezing where we walk our dogs, but it might be 39 degrees 5000 feet or 7000 feet up in the atmosphere, their automated snowfall outputs will never pick that up, and you'll never get snow in that scenario. And that happens pretty often, which is why you'd do better to just go to the various NWS websites and read the thoughts of professional meteorologists' expectations. They do all that manual work looking at the air columns, timing issues, etc... to make their forecasts.

 

[cdskier]

I find the weather.gov mountain forecasts link not very intuitive or easy to use.

Just click the yellow dot for "Enhanced" forecasts for a particular mountain towards the bottom of the page. That will bring you to a text forecast followed by various graphs for forecasted temps, snowfall amounts, etc.

For example if you look at the graph on the Mt Mansfield forecast (http://www.weather.gov/btv/mountain_enhanced?loc=MOUNT MANSFIELD) they're showing about 7 inches of snow on Saturday mostly falling between 6am and noon.

 

[Jcb890]

Just click the yellow dot for "Enhanced" forecasts for a particular mountain towards the bottom of the page. That will bring you to a text forecast followed by various graphs for forecasted temps, snowfall amounts, etc.

For example if you look at the graph on the Mt Mansfield forecast (http://www.weather.gov/btv/mountain_enhanced?loc=MOUNT MANSFIELD) they're showing about 7 inches of snow on Saturday mostly falling between 6am and noon.

Probably a dumb question, but I could't figure it out easily... do they only have Burlington VT area? Is there an option for NH?

Also, I know the mountains mostly by resort name, any good way to equate that with the actual mountain names found on that site?

 

[Jcb890]

If a storm occurs where it's cold long before, all during, and right after, their projections will likely be correct, because all the air columns up to space are probably < 32 degrees. The problem is an event like this one, where it's below freezing where we walk our dogs, but it might be 39 degrees 5000 feet or 7000 feet up in the atmosphere, their automated snowfall outputs will never pick that up, and you'll never get snow in that scenario. And that happens pretty often, which is why you'd do better to just go to the various NWS websites and read the thoughts of professional meteorologists' expectations. They do all that manual work looking at the air columns, timing issues, etc... to make their forecasts.

That makes sense, but I'm looking for a site which provides me this information. Is there a better option than looking at all of the individual reports?

 

[VTKilarney]

Hearing this blowtorch wrecked Stratton pretty good, down to bare spots in some places apparently.

I am surprised by how much snow we lost here in northern Vermont. The Burke webcam now shows a lot of grass at the base of the Mid-Burke Express.

 

[cdskier]

Probably a dumb question, but I could't figure it out easily... do they only have Burlington VT area? Is there an option for NH?

Also, I know the mountains mostly by resort name, any good way to equate that with the actual mountain names found on that site?

This is from the Burlington NWS office, so they only have the mountains within their coverage area. The NH mountains are mostly covered by the Portland NWS office. They don't seem to offer the same exact enhanced mountain forecasts (at least yet).

As for mountain names to ski areas...

Mt Ellen - Sugarbush
Mt Mansfield - Stowe
Jay Peak - Jay
Killington Peak - Killington
Ludlow Peak - Okemo

Once you get further south in VT you enter the Albany NWS office territory. A quick look at their website doesn't show the enhanced mountain point forecasts either that the Burlington office offers.

 

[cdskier]

I am surprised by how much snow we lost here in northern Vermont. The Burke webcam now shows a lot of grass at the base of the Mid-Burke Express.

I see a lot of bare ground around the base of the Castlerock lift at Sugarbush in the webcam view. Can't really tell much about the mountain itself as there's not too many good views of it from any of their webcams. A view from across the valley shows a lot of grass in the valley itself. The mountain trails are still white from that view, but it is so far away that there could be bare spots that you can't see from that distance. MRG's cam shows a decent amount of snow loss too. :sad:

 

[BenedictGomez]

I am surprised by how much snow we lost here in northern Vermont.

Was it really foggy last night / today?

 

[drjeff]

Anytime widespread fog is in the forecast, the sublimation effect on top of the rain and air temp melted is viscous to the snowpack, especially the natural snowpack!!

Less than 12hrs and we're back to below freezing temps over most all of ski country.

Fire up the guns, and let's see who's systems have the muscle to recover quickest!!

Sent from my XT1254 using AlpineZone mobile app

 

[cdskier]

Just looked at the 24 hour timelapse of the summit snow stake webcam at Sugarbush...yikes!

 

[BenedictGomez]

About to head out on the road to Wilmington on Operation Beat Incoming 32F.

 

[andrec10]

The carnage is bad!

 

[kingslug]

Im going next week. I'll watch ski movies and take care of a 10 hour online course I need to finish while the wife rests off her cold. I imagine the roads will be no fun..at ...all.

 

[VTKilarney]

Was it really foggy last night / today?

Not so much today (at least here at a lower elevation), but definitely last night and into the early morning hours.

 

[moguler6]

Probably a dumb question, but I could't figure it out easily... do they only have Burlington VT area? Is there an option for NH?

Also, I know the mountains mostly by resort name, any good way to equate that with the actual mountain names found on that site?

No mountain forecast, but the other offices do have the winter maps.

http://www.weather.gov/gyx/winter

BTV - for Vermont
GYX - for Maine NH
BOX - for MA
ALY - for NY and western MA