Exaggerated Snowfall Totals. Cool or Uncool?

I always take ski areas obs with a grain of salt..
I look at from a scientific angle.

All this inaccurate reporting is messing with the historical averages..Ever since the advent of social media, everyone one wants to report the deepest /coldest etc...Notice that someone always reports a huge number on every major event..
NWS now uses the public's observations for record purposes..These number are usually F'd up...

JasonWx wrote

 
All this inaccurate reporting is messing with the historical averages..Ever since the advent of social media, everyone one wants to report the deepest /coldest etc...Notice that someone always reports a huge number on every major event..
NWS now uses the public's observations for record purposes..These number are usually F'd up...

You bring up a very valid point about social media and wanting to beat thy neighbor. The NWS using public observations seems a bit effed up to me tho. Is that relatively new?

Yeah, it's a daily ANTICIPATED conditions report, so that has to factor in some.  However, this is their business, it shouldn't be that hard to update and keep it more current/accurate.  When a trail is listed as open but has a rope across all day....I think that's wrong.  I check the report throughout the day to decide where to move around the mountain.  Getting someplace based on posted info and finding a rope is not the result they should be going for.

Sort of along the lines of sketchy snow totals for marketing purposes.....I think there is something rotten in Denmark when WF lists Upper MacKenzie as "open" because you can technically access part of it from 2,200 Road.

technically that's called middle mac

Today Hunter Mtn on FB and instagram have been claiming they are expecting 3-4" of new snow today.  The forecast is not calling for that at all.  The storm is barely grazing Hunter to the north

louie.mirags wrote

Today Hunter Mtn on FB and instagram have been claiming they are expecting 3-4" of new snow today.  The forecast is not calling for that at all.  The storm is barely grazing Hunter to the north

but then again, if you're not smart enough to fact check advertising then that is your fault anyway

ScottyJack wrote

technically that's called middle mac

Sure.....and maybe they'll put that on the trail map some day.....but you know what I'm sayin'!

louie.mirags wrote

Today Hunter Mtn on FB and instagram have been claiming they are expecting 3-4" of new snow today.  The forecast is not calling for that at all.  The storm is barely grazing Hunter to the north

It would not shock me in the least if Hunter ends up with 3" today.

The funniest example of ridiculousness and non truth telling is Camelback.

Any time they get so much as a 1/4 inch of snow (and I'm not exaggerating) they say, "We have fresh POWDER!!!!!!" on their website, FB, etc....

And if there is supposed to be a storm, and there are 4 media snow map guesses, Camelback will take the one that predicts the most snow for them and post that one. LOL

Any of the mountains that I have been to seem to be pretty good with the numbers.  I used to think Jay Peak was full of crap.  Then after going there a couple times and seeing what they report to what I say fall I changed my tune.  Unless you live close by the hill it always appears they are inflating numbers.  The reality is WF can get 6 inches and if its windy you have no idea where it went.   The amount of snow they have this years has to be pretty close to a record.  Great snow pack.  This weekend with the warmer temps things are going to soften up and its going to be off the hook.  Cant wait.  Till then sell sell sell.

I think Sugarbush is notorious for bullshit snow reporting...guy over on TGR who lives at the base is always calling them out

Seems like a lot they report 1" base then like 10+ summit...seems off

Harvey wrote

Marketing is marketing.

Sorry for the drift but I found this article very interesting


https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-i-miss-old-people-workplace-tom-goodwin?trk=msn-river

First of all I will start by saying, that I fully support Plattekill Mountain, and it still goes down in my books as one of my favorite places to spend my time.

But back to the original topic of this thread. Something is drastically wrong here. Plattekill is reporting 230" of snow over the course of the 2016/17 season. Seems a bit steep, but If I didn't know any better, I would believe it.



Meanwhile Belleayre, within eyeshot of Plattekill is claiming 152"



Does Plattekill somehow magically get snow clouds that dump an extra 80" of snow right over their mountain? If so, how come Belleayre opened earlier and closed later than Plattekill?  Hell, the average for Woodstream is 78".

For weather reports, I go to forecast.weather.gov.  Insofar as conditions reports - rather than snowfall total - there are a couple of places on my s#!@ list due to, shall we say, severely embellishing on actual conditions.  And there's a newsgroup that I bailed out of for the same reason.

Fortunately most the the places I go to are owned by straight shooters who know that a straight-up report will keep people coming back.

Apocryphal story regarding Prospect Mountain: one year, the season pass holders had to convince Steve to open for Thanksgiving.  He didn't think conditions were good enough.  But it was good early season conditions.

Ethan Snow wrote

Sorry for the thread drift here, but are they seriously putting a gondola in at Belleayre? What the hell are they thinking wasting my (our) tax dollars for that?? What a freaking waste of resources!!

Love the title of this thread.

Marcski wrote

Sorry for the thread drift here, but are they seriously putting a gondola in at Belleayre? What the hell are they thinking wasting my (our) tax dollars for that?? What a freaking waste of resources!!

On that we agree. As I said in another thread, Laszlo really needs to buy Belleayre after we get a new governor who closes it down once he realizes what a waste of state money Belleayre really is. A joint Belleayre-Plattekill pass would be killer. Belleayre for the yuppies, and everyone midweek, and Plattekill for the experts on Weekends.

Harvey wrote

Love the title of this thread.

Thanks!

Ethan Snow wrote

Marcski wrote

Sorry for the thread drift here, but are they seriously putting a gondola in at Belleayre? What the hell are they thinking wasting my (our) tax dollars for that?? What a freaking waste of resources!!

On that we agree. As I said in another thread, Laszlo really needs to buy Belleayre after we get a new governor who closes it down once he realizes what a waste of state money Belleayre really is. A joint Belleayre-Plattekill pass would be killer. Belleayre for the yuppies, and everyone midweek, and Plattekill for the experts on Weekends.

Harvey wrote

Love the title of this thread.

Thanks!

On this, we disagree, Ethan. I'd much rather see Laz spend money buying and developing the area right adjacent to Plattekill. The terrain is awesome and northfacing. This, even though it would mean less sidecountry for me.  

I've been told that all I know is toking on weed and jumping off of 40 footers but I would think that it would be more cost effective for Plattekill if Bell closed and Plattekill spent their money on their own area. Make it as best as it could possibly be instead of taking on more overhead. But I don't know very much so take that with a grain of sodium chloride.

Perhaps you guys are right. I was just thinking maybe with some proper management, Belleayre could be run successfully, and the cost of developing the land adjacent to Plattekill could be costly. Not to mention Laz does not currently own that land. I have spoken personally to the man who does own it and he is not currently interested in selling it. In fact he thinks it's quite hilarious that Laszlo thinks he will develop it someday. Otherwise we would at the very least see an overflow parking lot developed already. The far end of Overlook actually crosses over onto the neighbors land. It goes back to the days when Plattekill was a joint ownership between the Finches and the Hinkleys, so I believe there is a right of way.

But who knows. It could be just a matter of time before they can hash it out and come to an agreement. I'd love to see it happen honestly. I also think that if Belleayre closes, and all those people come to Plattekill, even with the expansion, it will have a very hard time accommodating everyone without feeling crowded. That's what we all love about Plattekill now right? I'd like to keep the crowds separated.