Storm speculation March 10/11

[SKIQUATTRO]

heading to bolton sun/mon, hopefully thats far enough north..

 

[BenedictGomez]

I live too far away to cherry-pick my days, so I'm planning on Gore Saturday and Whiteface Sunday no matter what. Fingers crossed that the Thursday rain isn't too devastating. At a minimum, I'll ski two new mountains that received enough snow on Sunday that they'll at least have plenty of coverage.

I'm cautiously optimistic too, as they seem so uncertain as to the snow/rain behavior to begin with, as well as the fact that these forecasts are not conducted for elevation. I cant even tell you how many times I'd be driving to work in the morning through Waterbury or Moscow, towns near Stowe at about 500 - 800 feet elevation in a drizzle, and by the time I get to the mountain base just a few miles away it's snowing at about 1600 feet (let alone up the hill at 3200 feet).

 

[mlctvt]

NOAA is showing a total washout for southern VT Thursday through Saturday, Like 2-3 inches of moisture, currently forecast as mostly r**n.

We took last weekend off due to the washout but this sucks, two massive storms in two weeks both being just too warm. I was hoping for a good March, normal snowfall for March for Mount Snow is about 4 feet. Last year we got zero, this year?

 

[roark]

NOAA is showing a total washout for southern VT Thursday through Saturday, Like 2-3 inches of moisture, currently forecast as mostly r**n.

We took last weekend off due to the washout but this sucks, two massive storms in two weeks both being just too warm. I was hoping for a good March, normal snowfall for March for Mount Snow is about 4 feet. Last year we got zero, this year?

Go north.

 

[deadheadskier]

I'm watching this for a potential AZ summit preview on Sunday at Sugarloaf. Snowfields and Bracket are wide open right now. I work in Portland Saturday night, so if the rain line stays south, I maybe hitting the Loaf.

 

[BenedictGomez]

Go north.

The NOAA forecast even for Whiteface and Jay Peak is pretty horrendous too.

At this point, you have to pin your hopes on "they're wrong", which lets face it, isnt really that much of a long-shot.



<------ Still optimistic

 

[BenedictGomez]

Hope and you shall receive?

Accuweather is predicting at least 6" (or more) for upstate NY and up to 6" for parts of VT (I'd assume higher for JP)

Of course, there's this too...

Farther east across north-central Pennsylvania and interior New England, cold air will remain trapped as precipitation spreads over this region Wednesday afternoon. Precipitation will begin as a period of wet snow in cities such as Binghamton, Syracuse and Burlington before mixing with and changing to plain rain across most locations by Thursday.

But hey, at least they've bumped up the snow totals a bit...... Previously I only saw guesstimates of 1" or 1" - 3", so I view this positively.

 

[St. Bear]

I'm watching this for a potential AZ summit preview on Sunday at Sugarloaf. Snowfields and Bracket are wide open right now. I work in Portland Saturday night, so if the rain line stays south, I maybe hitting the Loaf.

As I said earlier, I'll be there as well, therefore I've been monitoring the weather situation pretty religiously.

Snowforecast.com has SL getting 4-7" on Thurs, 6" on Fri, and 1-4" on Sat. They do forecast a little rain mixed in for Thurs/Fri, but I'm hoping that the upper part of the mountain can be mostly spared.

 

[drjeff]

Hope and you shall receive?

Accuweather is predicting at least 6" (or more) for upstate NY and up to 6" for parts of VT (I'd assume higher for JP)

Of course, there's this too...



But hey, at least they've bumped up the snow totals a bit...... Previously I only saw guesstimates of 1" or 1" - 3", so I view this positively.

The problem with that map is it's snowfall through Thursday, when the cold air will be in place still, and only about 1/4th of the storm, both in terms of duration and precip has hit the Northeast. The problem is that later Thursday through Friday evening, the remaining 3/4ths of this storm will roll through with warm, moist air straight out of the Gulf of Mexico rushing North and giving likely atleast an inch of "immature snow" all the way to the Canadian Border.

The really, big model liquid totals as of now look to be over the Poconos/Western Catskills, where a swath of 4 to 7" of liquid could fall Model estimates for the Green's right now are in the 1-3" of liquid range, with similar to slightly higher estimates across the 'Daks.

The good thing, is if roads to ski areas aren't flooded out, this weekend looks like it could be a nice weekend of spring snow, with maybe a corn cycle setting up.

The bad thing is that if those precip estimates turn out to be true, our friends that frequent the Pocono's may be done for the year

 

[billski]

The problem with that map is it's snowfall through Thursday, when the cold air will be in place still, and only about 1/4th of the storm, both in terms of duration and precip has hit the Northeast. The problem is that later Thursday through Friday evening, the remaining 3/4ths of this storm will roll through with warm, moist air straight out of the Gulf of Mexico rushing North and giving likely atleast an inch of "immature snow" all the way to the Canadian Border.

The really, big model liquid totals as of now look to be over the Poconos/Western Catskills, where a swath of 4 to 7" of liquid could fall Model estimates for the Green's right now are in the 1-3" of liquid range, with similar to slightly higher estimates across the 'Daks.

The good thing, is if roads to ski areas aren't flooded out, this weekend looks like it could be a nice weekend of spring snow, with maybe a corn cycle setting up.

The bad thing is that if those precip estimates turn out to be true, our friends that frequent the Pocono's may be done for the year

+2. That mixing sux. I'm watching very closely and won't pull the trigger until Thurs night or Friday AM, depending on what resorts are reporting. I'm hoping, but not hopeful that higher elevations will be spared, but the valley temps seem too high to avoid it, given a 5 to 10 degree differential.

The other thing that bothers me is slick icy roads if I hit a transition zone. As this thing moves in and out vehicles could be victims as much as the snow.
I've built my Ullr pyre.

 

[hammer]

I'm hoping that this system moves out in time for at least the groomers to be in decent shape by Sunday...

Is it just me or is this weather similar to last March? :-x:-x:-x

 

[Glenn]

More rain in CT. Just what we need. I spent the last two days ripping out carpet and drying out or living room. Ugh.

 

[drjeff]

+2. That mixing sux. I'm watching very closely and won't pull the trigger until Thurs night or Friday AM, depending on what resorts are reporting. I'm hoping, but not hopeful that higher elevations will be spared, but the valley temps seem too high to avoid it, given a 5 to 10 degree differential.

The other thing that bothers me is slick icy roads if I hit a transition zone. As this thing moves in and out vehicles could be victims as much as the snow.
I've built my Ullr pyre.

If anything Bill, the Valleys may actually stay colder, as the winds aloft are going to be brisk and warm out of the Southwest bringing in the Gulf moisture. If the cold locks into the vallies, icy roads and freezing rain will be an issue down low with pure liquid up high. Although the air mass headed our way is pretty darn warm right now, and as a result with this storm, the WARMING will occur from the top of the air column down to the bottom as opposed to the usual version where the air colum COOLS from the top to the bottom

 

[drjeff]

I'm hoping that this system moves out in time for at least the groomers to be in decent shape by Sunday...

Is it just me or is this weather similar to last March? :-x:-x:-x

If the temps for Saturday happen, combined with the sunny forcast, even Saturday should be pretty decent with the exception of maybe 1st thing in the AM and some North facing slopes.

Gotta remember that the sun this time of year is getting pretty strong and also that the REALLY cold air right now is locked up over Hudson Bay, so it won't take too much to get things to soften, and that's *if* they even set up in the 1st place

 

[drjeff]

More rain in CT. Just what we need. I spent the last two days ripping out carpet and drying out or living room. Ugh.

Fingers crossed Glenn for this one, as it looks like the really heavy stuff will end up about 100 West of you this time. Although I'm sure that even an inch or 2 right now won't be appreciated!

 

[deadheadskier]

Probably gonna bag Sugarloaf on Sunday now.

Unless things change drastically for the better in the next 48 hours.

damn

the killer snowfields day eludes me again

 

[4aprice]

The bad thing is that if those precip estimates turn out to be true, our friends that frequent the Pocono's may be done for the year

The base has held up amazingly well so far and we've taken a couple of good body blows already. (last Sunday, the most recent.) It will be interesting to see how it takes Thursday. That being said if it kills it, it still will have been a great season for the Pocono's. I'm only looking at this weekend here then planning the next 2 up north.

Alex

Lake Hopatcong, NJ

 

[SKIQUATTRO]

its fact that cold air sinks and warm air rises, so at what point (altitude) does that stop? why is it then that its colder at the top of the mountain than at the base?

 

[BenedictGomez]

I'm watching very closely and won't pull the trigger until Thurs night or Friday AM, depending on what resorts are reporting. I'm hoping, but not hopeful that higher elevations will be spared

Same here.

I guess the best thing is if this thing rushes through faster than they're expecting (before the warm air mass arrives).

Though IIRC last week they also predicted drenching rain and it wound up being all snow, so I wonder if there's a chance of that happening again given that the high temps they're predicting for Thursday/Friday are only 35-41 and 33-41 for Whiteface and Stowe respectively? (i.e. those high temps have been ratcheted down quite a bit from the 38 - 45 degree high predictions they were calling for just yesterday).

<------------------- Still holding onto hope

 

[drjeff]

Same here.

I guess the best thing is if this thing rushes through faster than they're expecting (before the warm air mass arrives).

Though IIRC last week they also predicted drenching rain and it wound up being all snow, so I wonder if there's a chance of that happening again given that the high temps they're predicting for Thursday/Friday are only 35-41 and 33-41 for Whiteface and Stowe respectively? (i.e. those high temps have been ratcheted down quite a bit from the 38 - 45 degree high predictions they were calling for just yesterday).

<------------------- Still holding onto hope

One of the differences between last weekends storm and this one, is basically last week, the storm tracked acrossed the middle of the country (latitude wise) and then got it's big "gulp" of moisture from the relatively "cool" mid-atlantic region basically on Sunday. This one is getting it's gulp of moisture and coming at us from basically New Orleans and the warm air/warm water that's down there.

Plus temps wise, surface temps and temps aloft, where the precip starts falling out of the clouds can very quite alot, and it's the temps where the stuff starts falling from the clouds that matters the most