Forecast:
Saturday (1/18): Partly cloudy, highs in the mid to upper 20s, westerly 10 mph winds.
Sunday (1/19): Partly cloudy, highs in the low to mid 20s, westerly 10 mph winds with gusts to 25 mph.
Forecast Discussion:
Hello from Squaw Valley – I’m writing this forecast on Monday evening as opposed to the usual Tuesday morning as I plan to be skiing Tuesday morning before the NSAA conference.
Let’s start with the Tuesday / Tuesday night system. Both the CAIC WRF and the Canadian (GDPS) models are calling for 3” Tuesday through Tuesday night; while the NAM model is calling for 1.5”, the European (ECMWF) model is calling for 1”, and the American (GFS) model is only calling for ½”. Call me an optimist – but when the WRF (which is probably my favorite model) is aligning with the Canadian model (which has called the last few systems better than the others) agree on more snow – that’s a good sign. Let’s hope for the 3”.
Wednesday through Thursday are fairly pleasant weather-wise. I don’t like pleasant weather.
A rather complex system (part coming from the west, which I like as I’m in Squaw Valley much of this week, and part coming from the southwest) looks to hit our patrol area around Friday. Complexity in this case, unfortunately, doesn’t mean big snow. The Canadian (GDPS) model is calling for 4” on Friday; while both the European (ECMWF) and the American (GFS) are calling for 1”. Let’s hope the Canadians are right.
The American (GFS) and Canadian (GDPS) models agree on this weekend – highs in the 20s and relatively low winds as our patrol area goes.
Looking forward, the next system looks to come in around Wednesday January 22. It’s too far away to say much yet.
Looking back, on Sunday there was only a dusting of snow at Eldora’s parking lot and lower on the Jenny Creek trail, but close to 2” on Guinn Mountain. It was windy, but nothing at all like the 70 mph gusts predicted by the WRF model. And, although there was light snow in the morning, it was mostly sunny by the afternoon. Looking back at my forecast, while none of the models were spot-on, the Canadian model came out the closest to accurate.
As always, please let me know your thoughts and feedback. And you’ll notice that I’m now including the European Model into the forecast as I’ve found a website that provides for free some of its output. Due to the interface, I’m only planning on looking at the snowfall totals, at least for now.
-Jordan (Monday evening)
