“Delta” Force : UPDATED

December 7, 2011 2:26 pm | Category: Weather | 12 Comments | Permalink

The Delta Force is a special detail of the United States Army composed of a lot of very serious, very skilled and very deadly people. They are trained to accomplish missions the rest of us want no part in. One of their specialties (aside from rocking EXCELLENT dirtbikes) is rescuing hostages and high value targets held deep within enemy territory. And well damnit if this “Delta” force isn’t about to come in hot and rescue some high value skis held against their will in your hall closet.

You know, some people will tell you that you don’t hear the heavy chunk-chunk-chunk of the UH-60 Blackhawk rotors until you see the Delta troops fast roping down into your compund (which of course means you are offically fucked). Well lucky for us, we heard the rotors beating for our incoming Delta force over a week ago (twitter) (facebook). While it may only have been a faint whisper in the night back then, the rotor wash is hitting us in the face now and it’s time to get serious.

As I talked about here:
A deep 500mb trough is going to interact with a stalled front and spark surface cyclogenesis. As documented, this wave will move up along the front under the influence of the 500mb wave. As the low really deepens around Long Island/Conn. it will suck cooler air into the system on the west side, and maritime air from the east. Cool air + moisture is not complicated math. Certainly easier than that 3+3 = a meter computation or that weird high five math. Right. Exactly.

So where and when is Delta going to strike? Well the Delta looks to go guns “hot” sometime early thursday morning. At that time, enough cold air will have worked back into the system and the easterly maritime flow should be well established setting up…a turkey shoot for Delta’s big guns right at the Catskills, Berks, and Southern VT. Don’t believe me, well here:

Engage:

Pour it on:

Chase the runners down:

According to the GFS, Delta might even bring a motar team for a little extra fire power:

That’s a big round:

Walkin’ em back for the retreat:

Previously we talked about how maybe the R.O.E. wouldn’t really allow Delta to use all it’s weaponry. Maybe the L.Z. would even be a little too hot Delta would waste some ammo waiting for it to cool. And that’s still a concern, but looking increasingly LESS likely.

What IS looking possible and will ABSOLUTELY need to be watched is the chance to the LZ to move north.
See right now it looks like the models are verifying JUST south of where real time analysis shows the features are. So what may happen is that as this wave develops it will wrap up more north of where it’s currently modeled. Just looking at the real time conditions now, I’d say the models COULD be 30-50 miles south. Lets say that’s a 1/4 chance. Though the 12z Euro is east…hmmmm

So lets re-cap “Delta’s” mission objectives:
1. Deliver a tactical 8-16 inches of snow the the Eastern Catskills, Berkshires, Southern VT (up to about Rutland) and Souteastern NH.
2. Suppress the enemy around Mt. Washington with a similar 8-12 inches of snow.
3. Sweep the compund for evidence and leave 3-6 inches of snow in the southern ADK, and Central and Northern VT.
4. Kick Ass.

UPDATE:
While not as bad as Desert One this Delta strike didn’t really go as planned. Looks like a few factors including off shore convection and a more progressive flow aloft prevented the system from really wrapping up. This limited both the moisture and cold air available in the western region of the storm. As a result we likely (reports still need to come in) didn’t see the big totals down in the cats and berks. Maybe somebody still got in the 8-10 range but it’s going to be an isolated result and not indicative of the storm. I’d say sorry…but this is the weather and we know it changes at a moments notice. And hey I guess we learned a lesson, next time call the fuckin S.E.A.Ls.

And if you haven’t already, “stick your thumb up” at us on Facebook. That’s a good thing in Americuh.


TR: Down the Rabbit Hole

By: Ben
December 6, 2011 12:26 am | Category: Full Trip Report, Skiing | Permalink

This early season has taught us to Make The Best of It, without substantial snow in weeks and an unstable snowpack to boot. We’ve done some exploring though, and found some good hidden snow…

Click on the image to find out what lies Down the Rabbit Hole.


Cool it Bro. Seasonal Cold Air to Return. UPDATED: Potential Major Winter Storm “Delta”

December 5, 2011 10:24 am | Category: Weather | 7 Comments | Permalink

Been a bit warm around these parts. Or so I’ve heard. I’ve been too busy sacrificing goats and virgins to Ullr to pay attention. And maybe it worked out as it looks like we’ll have the return to a more seasonal pattern over the next ten days.

But first, a few thoughts on the near term weather this week.
Currently there is a cold front off to the west. This will push through the region sometime tomorrow. Moisture out front will fall as rain. YAY! The front SHOULD stall somewhere to the south and east running through southern NY, Mass and NH. Following that, a weak wave of energy will ride along and bring some light snow showers to the higher terrain.
A second stronger wave looks to develop sometime Wednesday. This is the wave i’ve been hinting at for a while now on twitter and facebook. Last week this wave looked like it wanted to develop into nice little snow maker for us. Now it doesn’t look so good. Looks like it stays open and passes to the south and east. Only really bringing snows to Maine if that. However, I’d like to add that until we see where this front stalls and where this wave develops late Tuesday, further meaningful analysis should be withheld.

UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE:
With the front’s location and timing starting to get resolved the major weather models are displaying some really interesting and noteworthy solutions. As of today, tuesday here’s the basic set up.
Sometime a 500mb trough moving over the carolina piedmont will spark the development of a surface low. This low will ride up and as the trough becomes negatively tilted with height somewhere over NJ/NY the low will rapidly depen and begin to occlude.

Once the low develops the pattern will look like this (trying a new image editor…and I don’t like it…anyway)
Delta Set up

So lets follow along. The black lines represent the position of the H5 trough first on wednesday when it’s deeply dug into the south and then more importantly, on thursday when it’s taken a negative around Delaware. (Editors note: I spent like a good 30 minutes figuring out the joke for “negative tilt” and “Delaware” and didn’t come up with anything but I know there is a Lolz in there). Anyway, the steep trough will spark a low to develop and ride along the frontal boundary…marked as a blue line.
By EARLY thursday morning the low will have reached the NY/Conn region and intensified sucking nice wet maritime air in from the ocean (green arrow) and pulling cold air in from the northwest (blue arrows). The result….is potentially heavy snow in the catskills, Berkshires and south NH. Again.

Here are two of the latest total water outputs:

and

That is excellent.
So what’s my take? Well I think the dead bullseye right now is the Berkshires where upwards of 1-2 feet of snow could fall. THere should be a similar strip of heavy snow extending back through the catskills and then on into southern NH. The caveat here is that THE THERMAL PROFILE HAS TO STAYS COLD ENOUGH. I know that’s a platitude but it’s true. Right now there is some doubt in my mind that the models are handling the temperature of this system properly. ITS very possible that much of this qpf falls as heavy mixed precip. The Albany NWS certainly has taken this approach and it has merit. I’m being hopeful and going with what Ullr has shown us he wants to do….not more than 6 weeks ago a storm with a similar track just dropped BOMBS on this region and I trust the past until proven otherwise.
North of that – in southern VT I think we could see 6-9 inches of snow with 3-5 north along the spine with Rutland being the dividing line between the 6-9 band to the south and the 3-5 totals to the north. However by the time we get all the way up to Route 2 don’t expect too much. At least that’s how it looks now.
Over in the NH we’ll see heavy snow in southern NH with the possibility for MT. Wash, if this pivots just a touch more to the NW to get into the 1-2 foot band easy.
Like much of Nor. VT, the ADK – and esp. the High Peaks – look to be hung out mostly dry for this event.

Beyond Delta, over the weekend we will likely get a shot of reinforcing cold air and possibly tap some great lakes moisture for an upslope event. But that’s a ways off and I need to address the REALLY long range first.

Looking LONG term, the forecast looks more wintery than it has in months. Currently the NAO, AO and PNA are all in just about the worst state for EC cold and snow. However, as show below, the ensemble forecasts for all three teleconnections show a return to a more neutral state. (red lines are individual forecasts of the ensemble system)

AO

NAO

PNA

So while I can’t say we’re going to pow-town or in store for any dy-no-mite events, a neutral state at this time of year at least comes with cold temps supportive of snow (natural or man-made).
All the major operational computer models are also showing run to run consistency depicting a more seasonal zonal pattern. At this point, I’ll take it. So there we have it. Lets see where it goes from here and remember: It could be a lot worse.


It Could Be A Lot Worse

By: Greg
December 3, 2011 4:21 pm | Category: Quick Update, Skiing | 15 Comments | Permalink

No, the snow wasn’t great today as December Dawns on the East Coast, and like much of what you stare at on TMZ, it wasn’t natural.
un-natural

Nor was the gnar anywhere to be found.
no gnar

But guess what: Who Cares? Certainly not this girl:
who cares?

Sometimes we all (esp. city dwelling dad) get lost in the quest for the “big line” and the deepest powder and forget that skiing is supposed to be fun; sometimes you just need to dust off the telemark gear and have fun being bad at something.
Greg tries telemark skiing

Thus we need days like today, where we take piste laps on icy bumpy snow under a cobalt sky above a stunning undercast lit by a late autumn sun to remind us, that hey–get over it–it could be a lot worse!
it could be a lot worse!

A LOT worse… enjoy!
it could be a lot worse!


Video: November Bliss

By: Allen
November 27, 2011 8:23 pm | Category: Skiing, WebiGNARs | 12 Comments | Permalink


November in the PNW has shaped up very well. We have gone from skiing a few inches of fresh on the glaciers to skiing deep pow in all of our favorite spots. Going into december, even with a warm up we have a full blown base, let another great season begin!


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