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January 31, 2008
Rain, Sleet, Snow, oh my
I couldn’t find anyone who braved Wednesday’s precipitation pu-pu platter to make it to the mountains, so I lack even second-hand knowledge of how the snow held up through the sleet, wind, rain and, yes, even snow.
Actually, many of the state’s chairlifts were shut down during the storm, so skiing and riding wasn’t even an option for most Vermonters on Wednesday (unless you were hiking the backcountry, and if you were, please tell me about it. That’s a story people need to hear). As such, snow surfaces will remain a mystery until this morning.
Frankly, I’m not optimistic, although this picture from Smugglers' Notch taken Wednesday does provide a beam of hope.
Apparently it started hammering in the hills about 2 p.m.; the ski areas were reporting 2 to 4 inches by the afternoon. But because the rest of the precipitation gamut was part of the package, they were a pyrrhic few inches.
Jay Peak’s snow report went “variable, frozen granular, icy.” Gotta love the honesty. The Tram, Flyer, Jet triple and Bonaventure Quad were all on wind hold.
Stowe closed down all lifts around noon because of lightning, of all things to strike in January. The Gondola and Sensation Quad remained closed the rest of the day.
Sugarbush shut everything down around noon.
But there’s good news on the horizon. A winter storm watch has been posted for southern Vermont, and a storm scheduled to arrive late Thursday night should hit all mountain areas with some form of frozen precipitation.
It will be more of this changing to that then back to this, but when all is said and done, Saturday could be a legitimate powder fest.
January 31, 2008 at 12:58 AM | Permalink
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