Plenty of White Stuff

While we aren’t going to see the wholesale dumping that we had across the country over Christmas it does look like we are going to have some fairly healthy activity for the resorts in the Pacific Northwest, The Northern Rockies, and the Northeastern States.

We really got hit pretty hard over the first part of the Holiday vacation. For example some areas of Southern California, which isn’t known for its might snowfalls, had nearly 3-4’ of snow falling in a single day (crazy!). These storm system made its way across the US and just worked a grip of resorts as it headed east. In particular the Utah and Wyoming Resorts had a ton of new snow…so much in fact that Jackson Hole had an avalanche which caused an in-bounds fatality. Check out the Fuel.tv story here.

Avalanche Kills Skier in Jackson Hole

It is always important to remember that our sport has a lot of risks…and while new snow is awesome on some levels it can create some very hazardous conditions at the same time. Please be safe out there.

As for the forecast we currently have a mix of high-pressure holding position across most of the middle of the country with pockets stretching from Southern California over to Texas and into the Midwest states. Further North we have one stormy low-pressure that is moving over the Great Lakes and into the NE…creating, wait for it, more lake-effect snow.

There is also a semi-new low-pressure moving into the Pacific NW sending in a ton of rain for the Coastal areas, even some potential flash floods for Oregon and Northern California coasts. This is also brining plenty of snow to the higher elevations…at this point Mt. Hood looks like it will have another 12-15” of snow over the next couple of days…and probably more later in the week as well.

Check out the current analysis map for the US and you can see the active areas.



Here are how some of the resorts are going to fair over the next few days.

West Coast Resorts

Mammoth Mountain
Base: 64-100”
New Surface: none
Snow Forecast Next 2 Days: 0”

Heavenly Mountain Resort
Base: 34-48”
New Surface: nope
Snow Forecast Next 2 Days: 0”

Mt Hood
Base: 17-52”
New Surface: incoming
Snow Forecast Next 2 Days: 10-15”

Whistler / Blackcomb
Base: 32”
New Surface: 1”
Snow Forecast Next 2 Days: 0”

Rocky Mountain Resorts

Sun Valley
Base: 42-48”
New Surface: none
Snow Forecast Next 2 Days: 4-6”

Jackson Hole
Base: 58-72”
New Surface: 8-10”
Snow Forecast Next 2 Days: 5-7”

Aspen / Snowmass
Base: 22-32”
New Surface: none
Snow Forecast Next 2 Days: 0”


East Coast Resorts

Whiteface
Base: 26-32”
New Surface: 0”
Snow Forecast Next 2 Days: 1-2”

Sugarbush Resort
Base: 26-48”
New Surface: 0”
Snow Forecast Next 2 Days: 0”

Black Mountain
Base: 15-36”
New Surface: 0”
Snow Forecast Next 2 Days: 0”

Long-Range Outlook

Like I said above long-range is continuing to look pretty active for the Northern States…basically draw a line from the border of Northern California across the US and anything above that line is going to see a couple of lows push across over the next couple of days. The current front moves out of the Pacific NW and drops some snow across Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and the Dakotas through the middle of the week. Another strong system starts the same process later in the week so it looks like more snow for those areas by the weekend.






Anyways that is what I got for the winter forecast…I’ll be back next Monday with the new update.