Is the weeks weather a season killer?

Need a big freeze to save whatever is left after the next 7 days.

It was over 70 in Central NY about this time last year, followed by a massive gully washer with thunder and lightning.  If it doesn't hit 70 on tuesday, we will  be doing better than last year. Next week looks a bit more seasonable, and Woodstream will be seeing some full bore snowmaking that week as Joe Snow will be home from college the following week.

I was at Windham yesterday (Sunday). From what I saw there, and even after the 1-2" they had had Saturday night, it's inconceivable to me how they could still be open come this weekend. It was getting just so icy towards the end of the day Sunday and people were taking spills left and right. I can't imagine how it fared today (Monday) and what 3 days of warmth and rain will do. I would imagine the other Catskills areas are in similar shape. It looks like they did a solid job of building and protecting a base but I just don't see how it lasts or how it gets rebuilt. But hope springs eternal.

I'm sure all the snowmaking trails will be just fine..The natural trails and woods , that's another story..

Snowy March.

I would say this will be close to a season killer unless there are some extended periods for snow making in the next 10 days.  I don't see that right now.  We are approaching a tipping point and extended winter in the northeast may only be for a good month.  

The average highs in the Catskills start to hit 40 degrees by the end of the first week of March. So unless we get a good extended run of below normal temps and above normal snow fall, I could see only Hunter making it until the end of March.  

Those webcams don't lie.

Traditionally Belleayre makes it longer than Hunter. Hunter gets all the credit for snowmaking around here, but truth is Belleayre makes a shit ton of snow too. And they have high elevation and favorable exposure. Since Peak bought Hunter they haven't made nearly as much snow.

High elevation and far north mountains like Whiteface would normally be fine but everything is super thin except a few blue and green trails.  So there will be skiing, but it won't be anything worth doing driving there for.

I have my sights set of Jay and Tremblant to keep my season alive.  Tremblant always blows a huge base on every trail and Jay has the best chance to get a big dump of snow and have just about everything open with powder while everywhere else is dirt and rocks.  K and Okemo max pass days will also be useful.

I hope you are right.  I have a freebie to use at Belleayre on the SKI3 card.

You're not joking on the web cams -- just saw Windham's and it's worse that I'd thought it would be two days later.

Very true.  Never ever read a mountains snow report, because it's generally just some kid from marketing writing about conditions that don't exist.

I'm sitting in my office with the windows open and the wind feels very warm.  The snow in my yard is gone except for the plow piles and my big lab was chest deep yesterday morning.  We are going to be on life support up here and everything south is toast.  I'll get a better report when my son comes back from training this afternoon.

Woodstream still has solid cover on the head wall, and I'm south. We'll lose some more snow today, but I can't imagine that any ski areas with good snowmaking will be on "life Support" more like got the flu, and set us back a bit and now we're trying to get healthy again.

How do you recover without making more snow?  Orda is not likely to make more snow or if they do it will just be the fan guns in a couple spots.

from belleayre's facebook "We still have compressors and can make snow when needed. We always shoot for the 2nd weekend in april...   we wiill make snow when temperatures allow us to. This weekend looks like it is hovering around maybe."


As a side note, we got that blizzard last year March 15th or so.  There is still hope for a solid dump!!

Mountains that blew a deep base when it was consistently cold are going to be fine.  ORDA doesn't have anywhere near enough capacity to get a deep enough base unless they sacrifice half their terrain like Whiteface tried to do earlier and still is super thin.  Gore is reporting 63 trails open but there's no way they actually do since they were even thinner than Whiteface.  If 15-16 and last year didn't teach them that they need more snowmaking capacity, then nothing will.

snoloco wrote

  If 15-16 and last year didn't teach them that they need more snowmaking capacity, then nothing will.

Sno I'll let you tell me...

What immutable fact are you ignoring here?

Holy (insert expletive here)!!! I just stepped outside to a heatwave. A pleasant morning of about 50 degrees with the windows down in my car. Now I'm trying to cool down. looks like they've changed the extended forecast as well. Lass favorable snowmaking temps for next week. I don't know what to do.

They just spent 28mil and the only skiing upgrade was the Belleayre gondola.  They clearly had enough money to get with the program on snowmaking and chose to spend it on things that won't matter at all in the grand scheme of things.  Now the Saddle Lodge at Gore simply had to be done, but everything at Whiteface is a total waste and is all part of their misguided quest to make it more intermediate friendly.

This week might be tough to survive.. The weekend might be the final dagger..