So its 45 mins into the first day of november which means that by the end of this month it is almost certain that at least a few of the mid-atlantic resorts will be open for skiing. My guess is that this is going to be a great early season and that next week will offer the first good opportunities for natural snow and snowmaking at mid-atlantic resorts (killingtion and places up north are a week ahead of us). My guess is that places like snowshoe, wisp, wintergreen, 7 springs, possibly timberline, and some of the NC areas will fire up before the 15th of this month and be ready for skiing on or before thanksgiving. As for the more local areas, i think that if the coming cold looks like it will persist and allow for consistent snowmaking temps from mid-noermber onward then we may see some of them fire up the guns between the 15th and 20th of Nov. As for opening dates, i would guess the week after thanksgiving or the first week of december. I know this is an extremely optimistic outlook but the models are pointing to a much colder pattern then we have been experiencing as of late and i strongly believe that when the cold comes it will be here to stay (not based on anything meteorologically, just a hunch ).

so... my predictions:
Snowshoe, 7Springs, Wisp, Wintergreen, some NC areas: early thanksgiving week

Canaan/Timberline- Dec 1st (they are lazy and probably will not go all out with snowmaking)

Whitetail, Liberty, Roundtop, Mass.- One or more of them may go all out for a thanksgiving or weekend after thanksgiving opening. If not i would guess week after thanksgiving-1st week in december


any other guesses?

dang it! now you jinxed it all !!! no skiing 'till dec!!!

God I hope so. We just have to hope against a warm snap but I'm not too optimistic. Last year we had a few warm snaps after Thanksgiving where it was in the 60s and barely back to freezing at night.

It's times like these that that old voice of pessimism and despair is needed- "the season is already over, this cold front won't be nearly as cold as the ones I used to experience as a kid 25,000 years ago. It'll warm up, a forecaster said so so it must be true. Then you all will see. It's George "Blue Knob" Bush's fault."

Sigh, my heart's just not into it. We got our first frost here in KC, but it was a temperature inversion so all of our smog stayed trapped this morning instead of merrily floating toward DC like it usually does. Back up to 70 this weekend followed by more cold air next week.

Opening dates? I'd love to see the WV Highlands rolling by Thanksgiving. Snowshoe made it open the weekend before T-Day a couple years ago, didn't they? If I remember right, it was a pretty cold November and Snowshoe and a few other resorts laid down enough snow to survive a December warm-up.

The admin of SkiNC is reporting that Snowshoe will start making snow tonight. The forecast doesn't look real good but maybe they'll at least try things out. What is it that they like to call it? Blow the mice out?

Sorry about jinx.... but it is really beginning to look like most of the higher elevation resorts (ones i see opening before tgiving) will be able to make snow around the clock at least a day or two next week and the WV highlands will definitely see a little accumulating snow (maybe an inch or two) sometime mid-week. Even up here in state college NWS predicts a high of 42 with rain/snow for next wed! And Murphy, it will get below freezing for at least a little while at shoe tonight and probably into the mid-20's tomorrow night so i would not be at all surprised if they try to crank out a little white stuff so they are ready for the real cold next week! And dont worry about me jinxing this forecast... ill make sure to knock on some wood immediately after submitting this post!!

Roger is right. It will be Bush's fault regardless. Just imagine, Santa Claus being waterboarded... his crime being suspicion of wearing red... Roger, you should try to return to civilization, we're going to have a fantastic winter here, cold temps, great snow, a tiny and short-lived thaw, and long-lasting white stuff in the mountains. I even gave up my Whistler vacation this year as I know the East will rule.

Ibotta,
I like you style!
The Colonel

I was up at Timberline over the weekend and the sign says, "Opening Date: December 6th." They have improved snowmaking over the past few years, including this summer, so I suspect T-line will open earlier than usual. I also expect pretty good terrain offerings by Christmas.

Hmmm... when did you move to Colorado Lou?

Miss Cleo's crystal ball. She told me from her jail cell in Brooklyn.

Colorado? Heck no, I go to Canada, Chile or Switzerland instead of Colorado or Utah. Better skiing, less crowds, incredibly better food, and I feel better spending my money there.

Seven Springs usually starts making snow as soon as it gets cold enough to get deep enough snow on Wagner and Fawn Lane to open for a weekend.

And with the exchange rate the way it is, you will definitely be spending your money this winter. Enjoy!

You made Thanksgiving plans yet?

Looks like from tonight around midnight-3 am through maybe even friday snowshoe and somewhat the valley/7-springs/wisp should be able to make snow close to 24hrs/day (wintergreen and the NC areas should be able to get in on the action as well). Also, dont be surprised if the valley, 7 springs, wisp, and shoe pick up 1-3 inches of natural over this week and possibly 3-5 friday-saturday. I would be very disappointed if all higher level resorts did not capitalize off of this week's cold weather. Realistically, i think if snowshoe wanted to they could open up at least 3-5 trails for skiing this coming weekend... but my guess is that there is no way they would be that ambitious with snowmaking... too bad

haha.... i just posted my snow/snowmaking prediction for this week based on model outputs from 12z today and decide to check what the NWS predicts for snowshoe just for fun and it is exactly the same as my forecast!! looks like my meteorology classes are paying off!!!!

NWS forecast for snowshoe (if anything colder than i expected)

If i'm not mistaken, it looks like there is snow on the Honi-Honi Bar in DCL. The Wisp webcams seem to not be uploading, but this one does.

http://www.deepcreekcam.com/d/index.cfm

Anyone elses input?

Oh, and if anyone else knows a better site where Wisps webcams are more updated, could you post it??
Thanks.

langleyskiier,
Are you considering majoring in the science of weather? Sure wish I had when in college 45 years ago. I play with it, keep records, etc. even today.
It is great to have a fellow DCSkier as our "official" weatherman.
Biggest problem Snowshoe is going to have with snowmaking this week is the high wind. But in the trees it should be ok. Wonder what happens if they aim the snow guns more horizontal or even a bit downward? Does the air/water mixture have time to form snow?
The Colonel

Colonel-

I actually am already in my sophomore year of metrology at penn state which is interesting and i like it except for the crazy amounts of math and physics. I really enjoy learning how to forecast and why certain things happen in the atmosphere (basic ex- why it gets colder as you go higher in the atm). I'll try as often as possible to post updates about upcoming storms or pattern changes so that everyone here does not have to rely on crackuweather.com.

I have always wondered myself about why resorts aim their guns so high especially when it is windy and half of what they make gets blown away. What i believe resorts do when it is windy and temps are low enough is increase the ratio of water/compressed air so that the droplets that form are larger and fall faster.... meaning less gets blown off the hill. However, i am sure this makes for much denser "snow" which would turn to ice faster, but this does not really matter when they are making snow in preparation for a opening that is a few weeks out. Also, i think resorts use the guns that are close to the ground (opposed to fan guns) as much as possible when it is windy so the snow has less of a chance to blow away.

That explains the sharper posts! Crackuweather!??! Be careful..you might end up working for them Arn't they based in State College? If so, have you or will you go CK out their operation? They nailed this cold & snow snap a couple of weeks ago so maybe they are getting better.
Here I am..145 am doing what i've done for years..Snow hounding! Watching this event trying to move the cold air down to the valley(1 tracked weather concerns)...Its still about 42ish & the Dolly Sods Cam is not showing temps again the temp should start to drop at a good clip now that the wind has turned more westerly & maybe the cam will show some white by morn...tonite will be better for snow watching....Good luck with everything!

out of curiosity.. why do they call it the "Dolly Sods cam"? the camera is not in dolly sods, and you cant see dolly sods from it obviously since the sods is on the other side of cabin mt and weiss knob. It should be called "canaan valley cam" shouldnt it?

haha... ya sorry about the harsh remarks about accuweather, Their short term forecasts and discussions are very well done but i just think it is ridiculous to put out a 15 day forecast because with today's technology that is just not reasonable. Also, i am against the way that they oppose the NWS and lobby for its demise..... but thats all another issue

.... back on topic.... its now 27 on the dolly sods cam and i doubt it is going to go much higher then 32 today up there. Also, there is a dusting of snow on the ground at 7 springs! Too bad they are not making any snow.

crunchy - I've wondered the same thing myself so I started cruisin' around the USDA-Forest Service site. Seems like the camera was originally located to the east of Canaan Valley and was pointed at Weiss Knob. The view was later changed to look at Rich Mtn, with the camera in the same location. Both of these views actually looked across Dolly Sods, which makes sense to call the station "Dolly Sods". And by the way, the met data instruments were at Bearden Knob while the camera was well to the east and south (go figure....must have been for easier access to the instruments or something).

But then the camera was moved to the Bearden Knob location, probably because that would put the met instruments and the camera in the same location (for ease of maintenance...get to all the devices at the same time?).

Anyway, the Bearden Knob camera is supposed to be aimed at Mount Porte Crayon; surely they realize they are no longer looking across Dolly Sods, but they haven't changed the designation of the station.

And of course, based on the recent reset of the camera, as far as I can tell it isn't even looking at Mount Porte Crayon anymore, so all the data it is collecting is bogus, right!

So we all dont have to check 100 different cams and sits for what is happening at our local areas here are resort cams/dolly sods cam:

-these will all update automatically

Dolly Sods:
Current Temp:


7 Springs:




Wisp: (hope thi9s is current but not sure)
http://www.mavcosys.com/images/wisp/20.jpg

Cataloochee, NC: (they claim they will start snowmaking operations today)



Cant think of any other good ones...

Its January at Snowshoe.......

http://www.snowshoemtn.com/mountain/photos/November07/powdermonkey.htm

MAN!!! You are a slacker...what about Sugar Mtn,NC ?!! ..Ck out that 27 degree temp holding steady LSkier..MPC is looking dark over there..maybe its Whitening up!

Actually... i tried to get sugar but i could not link it because the webcam is constantly streaming and uses windows media player... but if you go to their site they are really blasting some white stuff! Also, here at Penn State we have just recorded within the last few hrs our first flakes of the year!!! Hopefully we will get a few squalls over the next day or two and maybe a dusting out of it.

...if you want to talk about slackers then just look at snowshoe. they refuse to keep up with modern times and still do not have a webcam which really makes me mad. i mean come on! even the hillbilly (not bashing... its why we all love it) resort of timberline has a webcam (and a pretty nice site now as well)!!

An automatic feed to what is going on around a ski resort is not always good a good thing for the resort. Say for instance there weather report say "precipitation" or "possible snow showers" and their webcam showed a wild monsoon, people probably wouldn't show up the next day to ski. That is why in Snowshoe's case they seem to hire professional photographers to capture beautiful pictures on the good days (and only of the good things, ie. 2 feet of powder) to display as their "up to date" views of the mountain. I would venture to say that if you went through last years pic archives you could correlate bad weather to the days without any pictures....just a thought though....

But yeah, I agree that I would like to see them get a webcam. It is always encouraging to see what exactly is happening from a real time perspective.

High country webcams has a top view & a front view of Sugar....+ Cams out the ying yang of everywhere else! I'm pushing my limit by just logging on to a computer, so no help here ...there will be some snow watching soon for the Alpps..its a coming..

Snowshoe web cam??!!
At one time I remember there was a problem with broadcasting and the nearby radio observatory. Not sure this is still true since during construction of Expedition Station there was a real time web cam showing the state of construction. Anyone know why no Snowshoe web cam?
The Colonel

That may be a good explanation. I was at the Greenbank Radio Observatory over the summer and learned some interesting things about it. They keep a tight rein on tons of electronic devices in that area. There are no microwaves on the site, do not allow new cell phone towers anywhere in the region, and the most crazy of all: they only drive diesel engine vehicles (no spark plugs) on the site. It was funny taking the tour because there was all of these OLD diesel vehicles around that made the place look like something right out of a scary movie. Anyway, the radio-telescope is VERY sensitive (I mean it picks up radio frequencies from far out in space) so any electrical device in the vicinity cause lots of problems. The tour guide actually said that a few years back they were getting some sort of terrible/unusual interference, which they finally tracked down to an electric blanket in a dog box (somewhere about 15 miles away) that was shorting out.... Back on topic: maybe the webcam causes interference?????????

[quote=David]
An automatic feed to what is going on around a ski resort is not always good a good thing for the resort. Say for instance there weather report say "precipitation" or "possible snow showers" and their webcam showed a wild monsoon, people probably wouldn't show up the next day to ski. That is why in Snowshoe's case they seem to hire professional photographers to capture beautiful pictures on the good days (and only of the good things, ie. 2 feet of powder) to display as their "up to date" views of the mountain. I would venture to say that if you went through last years pic archives you could correlate bad weather to the days without any pictures....just a thought though..../quote]

Agreed David, i would guess this is their #1 reason which i think is kinda ridiculous and like i said... they are not really coming to terms with the modern age and what people expect of a resort. Wisp for example has undergone a huge "push" of upgrades and has installed more cams then any resort worldwide i know of.

I think they are up to about 1 for each slope!!! I love it!

BTW, I was walking out of Buffalo Wild Wings after some mighty fine wings on 40 cent wing night and low and behold, what beautiful sight did I see??? What is that white stuff that falls out of the sky when it is cold out?? Ummmm, I think that would be called SNOW!!!!!!!!!!! So I saw my first snow of the season here in Bridgeport, WV at about 10:30.

Ok that's wrong to announce when us east coaster WVians haven't seen any yet. :P

there would be a problem broadcasting if they were doing anything outside of the normal unlicensed spectrum (that's why you are allowed to use your walkie-talkies there). Another way around the problem would be if they just hardwired a webcam somewhere. You would think that with all their facilities at the top of the mountain it would be very easy to mount a camera somewhere with a great vista.

They're more proud of the real estate than the mountain???

Sorry about that. I was just really excited last night when I saw that white some coming down. If it makes you feel any better it really wasn't coming "down". Since the wind was blowing at Gale Force it was coming in sideways, which made for a really cold walk to the car.





Sadly I think statement is 100% correct