I figured I'd start a Whitetail thread, though the initial news isn't good.
I don't know about Southern PA, but the DC area forecast looks pretty warm for the near term
Yes this is a bummer, but fortunately it happened as the weather is getting warmer so they shouldn't miss too much snowmaking time. Had this happened a week ago, that would have been really bad! I was out today and they have a good amount of snow on the trails...it should certainly carry them through this warm spell.
Surprisingly good corn snow conditions at Whitetail today with no crowds. Parts of Snowpark, Limelight and Homerun are narrow but overall the snow base is good and should mostly survive the warmth of the next few days. 
👏👏👏
Pics from Whitetail today at about 2pm. Narrow trails. Thin cover. Slush. Lots of brown. Nobody there. They were shutting the lodge at 5pm. Pizza joint not open at all despite posted hours. Fancy restaurant open Thurs to Sun only. A regular Snickers Bar costs $4.50. The whole thing felt kinda post apocalyptic.
Interesting to look back on how Whitetail came about - and barely survived - previous poor winters...
900+ plus vertical feet of wide southern aspect slopes - rough
Yeah looks pretty good considering the winter we've had so far. Maybe an inch or 2 so by noon.
Looks like we ended up with about 4 inches of snow today. This is off my porch in the Whitetail village. 
Nice pic BaySailor - did any of that 4" stick around?
Probably going to whitetail Saturday early with low temps looking ok for night time snowmaking.
Thats what she said
hotelterp wrote:
Nice pic BaySailor - did any of that 4" stick around?
Probably going to whitetail Saturday early with low temps looking ok for night time snowmaking.
I just got back up here to Whitetail tonight., The natural snow is pretty much gone, but the guns have been blazing the mountain continously since Thursday night. They won't have any new terrain open yet, but what is open should be much better than the past couple weeks. With the colder temps forecast for the coming week, I'm hopeful next weekend they will have a lot more of the mountain open. Keeping my fingers crossed! 🤞
hotelterp wrote:
Nice pic BaySailor - did any of that 4" stick around?
Probably going to whitetail Saturday early with low temps looking ok for night time snowmaking.
i’ve been watching the same cams. things have been looking… grim… until 24 hours ago. but they’ve been blowing nonstop today.
i’m heading up there tomorrow (thursday feb 2nd) and i’ll try to post a report. only blue listed as open is angel drop but the cameras suggested they were blowing almost everywhere. if they get fanciful open i could happily lap that all day. if they still only have greens and angel drop, i’m probably not going to be staying long.
i have a five day pass and i can’t believe it is taking until february to burn the first day!
at the mountain now. cameras pretty much tell the full story. fanciful and sidewinder aren’t on the cams but are both open with mostly decent coverage. i can’t see how they will get any of the blacks open. limelight has snow everywhere except the very bottom so it isn’t open. looks like they have a drainage problem at the bottom.
food court is open, which is nice. lift lines are nonexistent, as are my skills apparently. my plan is to lap fanciful and angel drop all afternoon, then leave when it gets dark.
it’s a bummer they don’t have more snow down, but if i’m being honest, the other two blues and the blacks likely wouldn’t change my experience much. i don’t really seek moguls these days, and the groomers are all more or less the same.
cheers!
chuck_wow wrote:
Just looked at the cams and damn that looks awful. I know it can be fun skiing alone but I don't think I'd burn the gas to get to mud mountain.
What they have open doesn’t look bad, and they should be able to run snowmaking non stop until Sunday morning. They should open another trail or 2 and probably get the best base they have had all season.
And then Tues, Wed, Thursday daytime highs forecasted for 55F and nightly lows stay above freezing. I hope they make some whales.
Moral of the story: get it this weekend because next weekend likely won't be good.
Conditions were pretty good today - very soft and slightly slow under snow fans lots of side hits and fun features
it was deceptively crowded lots of people but singles line on quad was less than 5 min wait max
Bold decision looks ready for opening? One can hope
Looks like Whitetail is trying to get Bold Decision ready to open. And they just started re-making snow on Exhibition, although that still has a ways to go (and the snowmaking forecast isn't looking too great after today). Have they made any snow on Far Side?
i was looking at the webcam this morning, and saw a snowboarder coming down bold decision. turns out it was an employee... there was a snowmobile at the bottom with some other folks milling around.
but at least one human managed to do a black at Whitetail this year! he might end up in rare company.
I was up there today. Nothing yet on Far Side Scott. Unfortunately I'm not feeling that optimistic about Far side opening this year. At the rate we are going, it may just be Drop In/Bold Decision for the blacks this year. Here is to hoping for a big change in the weather!
Scott wrote:
Looks like Whitetail is trying to get Bold Decision ready to open. And they just started re-making snow on Exhibition, although that still has a ways to go (and the snowmaking forecast isn't looking too great after today). Have they made any snow on Far Side?
i lied. managed to get back to wt today. limelight was open but the entrance to it was an absolute disaster. narrow and with dirty/rocky patches. gross way to start an otherwise decent run!
homerun was also open, but shouldn’t have been. i only did it once, and hit two rocks. grrrr…
angel drop was fine.
bold decision and drop in were surprisingly fun today. i think i’m used to them being icy. corn/slush aren’t so bad if you’re in the right frame of mind.
i’m really glad i went. i don’t know how long things will last if they can’t blow more.
the webcam/forecast definitely give a "done for the season" vibe :-(.
i have 3 days left on my epic pass, so i'm guessing... roadtrip!
mdr227 wrote:
Definitely looks like it is going to be a challenge to get runs in any kind of condition for the weekend with a warm night to come and more rain tomorrow with a very limited (if any at all) snowmaking window tomorrow night. Doesn't look like any good cold spells for the next couple of weeks so would not be surprised to see WT close very soon for the season. Does anyone remember the last time there was such a dreadful season at Whitetail with three top to bottom runs never opening at all?
Per my ski instructor friend at Whitetail, last opening date will be 3/12 this year.
You are spot on yotestang. We have a condo up there, so I watch the weather, web cams, and updates a couple times a day. WT has made snow at every opportunity from what I saw. When the pump went down in December. the warm up was well on it's way so you are right, they only lost a few hours of marginal snowmaking. Other than that, they were pumping it out every chance they had. Most folks don't understand. Just because it is below 32 doesn't mean they can make snow. It is all about the wet bulb temperature....If there is high humidity, it needs to be well below that 32 temp in order to make snow. Mother nature had other plans this year...I don't blame Vail. As big as they are, they haven't found a way to control the weather!
Regarding the bar, I'm just happy they have one now. Credit there goes to Snowtime. Franklin County didn't make that easy. It only took nearly 30 years!
yotestang wrote:
Whitetail opened (12/24) before the other former ST resorts, largely because they had been making snow at every opportunity. There was almost enough snow to push in late November/ early December before a big warm up. Then came the extreme cold snap at the end of December, and WT crushed it. The temps began to warm and on 12/28 a pump went down. Snowmaking was still possible without this part, but at a reduced capacity. I think WT was a victim of its own transparency in telling folks. The pump literally went down in a window of unfavorable weather for snowmaking and was replaced by the next window of snowmaking, with maybe 6 hours of reduced capacity snowmaking. At any point the wet bulb value read 28F or lower for at least 6 hours, WT made snow. The duration of high temps, rain, and unfavorable SE aspect are hard to overcome, but it is likely WT has more snowmaking power than most resorts on the east coast in the Vail system. It is easy to find yourself upset about the hand we were dealt this winter as the end seems very near, and very early; but for once I dont think Vail screwed anything up other than maybe going for Angel Drop to Home Run for opening, otherwise guns were added over the summer to lower elevation positions on notoriously thin trails (Fanciful, Limelight) and used. If we want to gang up on Vail, why is the bar hidden in the back of an upstairs room?!?
RodneyBD wrote:
There were multiple wet bulb temp windows to make some whales for base in November and early December. Look it up. Vail CHOSE to not fire up the guns. These are facts. Don't believe it? Brett Cook literally SAID SO HIMSELF in an interview on the Storm Skiing Journal. Whether or not the blown snow would have survived is conjecture and irrelevant. They didn't give themselves the best chance of putting out a half decent product on their south facing banana belt hill.
Same is true for Wintergreen. The past few winters have all had cold shots around Thanksgiving, allowing places to blow snow and start building bases, or at the very least get a run open. They've instead chosen to wait until mid-December. History has shown that cold temps are not guaranteed that time of year, and they've suffered as a result. Wintergreen, Whitetail, Bryce, Massanutten...they all have to blow snow full speed every cold shot they get these days, even if that means Thanksgiving.
Rodney, Whitetail was making snow in November. Here's a photo from Nov 22, 2022. Brett is no longer at Whitetail....I wasn't following Seven Springs where he is now so can't speak to snowmaking there, but I know WT went all in with that cold snap prior to Thanksgiving. It didn't pan out, but they absolutely tried!
RodneyBD wrote:
There were multiple wet bulb temp windows to make some whales for base in November and early December. Look it up. Vail CHOSE to not fire up the guns. These are facts. Don't believe it? Brett Cook literally SAID SO HIMSELF in an interview on the Storm Skiing Journal. Whether or not the blown snow would have survived is conjecture and irrelevant. They didn't give themselves the best chance of putting out a half decent product on their south facing banana belt hill.
Doing it for the gram and really doing it are usually two different things.
rbrtlav wrote:
If you look up on AccuWeather history the cold nights after November 13th or so almost all of them will map to facebook/instagram posts with snowmaking. I doubt they missed many nights where both temperatures and humidity cooperated. There might have been a few where the temperature ended up being colder than forecasted and they weren’t prepared, but not enough to make a significant difference with the weather we had.
Exactly. Testing guns and sharing pictures isn't the same thing as making snow for base. You all have been hoodwinked. Whitetail closed the week after President's week- and the first to close in the entire state of Pennsylvania- Pathetic.
chuck_wow wrote:
Doing it for the gram and really doing it are usually two different things.
rbrtlav wrote:
If you look up on AccuWeather history the cold nights after November 13th or so almost all of them will map to facebook/instagram posts with snowmaking. I doubt they missed many nights where both temperatures and humidity cooperated. There might have been a few where the temperature ended up being colder than forecasted and they weren’t prepared, but not enough to make a significant difference with the weather we had.
