Tag: Storm

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Snow line around 1,500′ this morning

It was ~41 F at the house this morning, so I suspected that the snow level was still a bit high for new powder in the easily accessible elevations, but I checked in at Bolton on the way in to Burlington this morning to get a handle on where things were at in terms of base and new snow.  I could tell that it wasn’t yet a huge hit below 2,500’ yet because the cars coming down the road didn’t have snow on them, but the precipitation certainly looked like snow up high.  Here’s the vertical temperature profile I observed on the Bolton Valley access road around 7:00 A.M. with comments on the precipitation/accumulation; hopefully it will be useful for other mountain recreationalists:

340’:  41F (light rain)
950’:  40F (light/moderate rain)
1,100’:  39F (moderate rain)
1,500’:  38F (moderate rain/snow)
1,800’:  37F (moderate snow)
2,000’:  36F (moderate snow)
2,100’:  35F (moderate snow, accumulating)

As you can see from the above list, snow wasn’t accumulating until I reached the village at 2,100’, but it seemed to be accumulating on most surfaces other than the pavement, and there was probably ¼ inch down when I was there.  Skier’s left of Beech Seal showed a couple of breaks in coverage, as I suspected it would based on my Sunday observations, but it was still pretty close to continuous.

Even back down in the valley, there were some bouts of moderate precipitation, so hopefully that continues to hit the mountains.  Roger Hill was thinking that the snow level would rise a bit during the day today, so that may have to be factored in as well.

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Heavy rainfall and more high water today

I haven’t seen any snow with this system, but last night’s precipitation seems worthy of note because we had 2.30 inches of liquid and the Winooski is back up even with our local VAST bridge as it was on the 11th, despite the fact that most of the snow has already melted in the lower elevations.  Some area schools are closed due to road access issues with this event.  I just summed my CoCoRaHS numbers for April and with this latest event the total liquid is right at 8.00 inches for the month thus far.  While I had that open I grabbed a few additional liquid numbers.  For the 2011 calendar year up to this point at my reporting location the liquid precipitation is at 20.46 inches, for the 2010 calendar year the total was 54.17 inches, and for the ’10-’11 snowfall season as it currently stands (October 15th, 2010 – April 16th, 2011), the total was 28.09 inches.

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The snow in the yard has melted

The last of the snow in the yard melted today, so I can finish off that portion of my seasonal snowfall numbers.  The data for the last of the snow melting out in the yard (as of this season the mean date is April 15th ± 10 days) is actually something I’ve recorded all the way back since our first winter here (2006-2007) and April 24th is one day later than the previous record I had down (April 23rd, 2007).  This puts the continuous snowpack season in the yard at 141 days, which is exactly the same number recorded for ’06-’07.  Both of those seasons had slow starts with poor November snowfall, and snowpack that did not become established until early December, so they are well behind the highest value of 152 days recorded for the 2007-2008 season.  The next benchmark I’ll monitor will be when the last of the snow melts out in our neighborhood, which tends to be about a week beyond when the snow melts out at the house.

As I was skiing at Bolton yesterday I was reminded of some outings in April ’07, and realized that while the snowpack is in excellent shape this spring, the skiing this month has really paled in comparison to the equivalent period back in ’07.  Even down at this elevation we had almost two feet of snowfall in April ’07, and this season we’ve had just 4.4 inches.  I’m not sure what the mountains have had this April, but in ’07 it was measured in feet; I skied one day mid month on the mountain where I found up to 19 inches of new snow, and that was for just one of the storms.  The reading from the Mansfield stake on Friday was certainly respectable at 82 inches, but for the same date in ’07 it was actually at 84 inches.  It’s really been just an issue of the storm track this April; the moisture has been there, but the track has been too far to the north/west to get into the appropriate combination of precipitation and temperature.  With a good track over the past few weeks we probably would have had another April 2007 on our hands.  I think that the past couple of springs have been so poor in the snowfall department that some perspective has been lost on April’s potential, this one is good in terms of base/snowpack, but I’d say subpar for snowfall (we’re still below average by a few inches at the house).

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Bolton Valley, VT 07APR2011

Image of track on the Glades trail at Bolton Valley
Adding another set of tracks to the Glades trail

I headed up to Bolton Valley today and got in on some of the powder from the recent snowfall.  The depth of the new snow was topping out in the 9-inch range, but the nice density gradient had it skiing deep just as Denis commented in his report from Stowe, and Powderfreak indicated in his initial update as well.  It was another great April powder day in the Northern Greens, read my full report to see more pictures and details.

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100 Inches

Mt. Mansfield and Waterbury Vermont snowpack plot for April 5th, 2011
The snowpack at the Mt. Mansfield stake hit 100 inches after yesterday’s snowfall – click for the full size plot
The snowpack at the Mt. Mansfield stake has been flirting with the 100-inch mark for several weeks, but thanks to yesterday’s snow, the afternoon reading indicated that we’d finally hit the century mark.  A depth of 100 inches at the stake is a nice benchmark indicating an excellent snowpack in the Northern Green Mountains, so the base depths for skiing should be decent for quite some time.  Down in the valley, the snowpack at our house in Waterbury was at 16 inches as of this morning’s reading.  I’ve added my latest plot for the Mt. Mansfield and Waterbury snow depths in this post.
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Thursday afternoon NWS snow accumulations forecast update

BTV NWS Storm Total Snow Forecast map
The Thursday afternoon update for the Storm Total Snow Forecast map from the National Weather Service in Burlington - click for the full size image

The afternoon update to the Storm Total Snow Forecast map from the National Weather Service in Burlington suggests a few inches less accumulation all around.  A comparison to the previous map is in my afternoon post to the Northern New England thread at Americanwx.com.

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NWS potential snowfall update from mid morning

Snowfall accumulations map for Vermont and Northern New York
Mid morning update on potential snow accumulations from the National Weather Service in Burlington - click for full size image

The National Weather Service in Burlington updated their potential snowfall accumulations map mid morning today, so I’ve added the latest version here.  I discussed some differences from yesterday afternoon’s map in a post in the Northern New England thread at Americanwx.com.

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Storm incoming, 1 to 2 feet possible for the Greens

Winter Weather Advisories Map from the BTV NWS
The winter storm watches from yesterday have been upgraded to winter weather advisories and winter storm warnings today

I’ve added the updated advisories and warnings map from the National Weather Service Office in Burlington, but their projected accumulations map looks similar to yesterday, so I’ll just refer to the one that was already posted earlier in the blog.  In his forecast from this morning, Roger Hill suggested the potential for 1 to 2 feet in the Green Mountains, with 6 to 10 or 8 to 14 for some valley locations and the potential for school closures.  Looking at the winter storm warnings from BTV, it seems that the biggest totals are more south of here, although as is often the case, if upslope gets into the picture later in the storm cycle, the Northern Greens seem to do pretty well.  The current point forecast for our location in the Winooski Valley at ~500’ suggests 5 to 10 inches through tomorrow, and then additional snow Friday night, Saturday, and Saturday night.  We’ll have to see how this system goes around here, but similar to what we saw in 2007-2008, we would be closing in on the 200-inch mark for seasonal snowfall at our location if we get a decent dump.

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Afternoon update on potential snowstorm

BTV NWS Accumulations Map
Snowfall predictions from the Burlington NWS updated this afternoon - click for the full size image

I’ve added the latest Storm Total Snow Forecast map from the Burlington office of the National Weather Service in this post.  The models are still moving around with the exact track of the system, but the NWS meteorologists feel that we’ve got a shot at some decent snow in the area.  More details and a comparison of the morning and afternoon maps for potential accumulations are in my afternoon post in the NNE thread at Americanwx.com.