Take 2

More photos...less than a thousand words:

 

Word from several sources is that the model runs are coming together for a Pattern Change about the end of the month!

The Sacramento NWS Office seems to be leading the charge...as they would. I think of them as the Chamber of Commerce of Forecast Offices...Cheerleaders even...

 

There is a pretty robust system on the horizon, even Bryan Allegretto, OpenSnow.com's Tahoe Snow Forecaster, the forecaster I trust the most long range-wise is a believer...so far.

Bryan has been the only standout these past two atypical winters when it comes to 1 week+ forecasts, always calling the inevitable fizzled forecasts from the rest. Always later and less than the NWS forecasts. In the main, Bryan nailed all the changes AND the timing.

BA is like oil on troubled waters to me...

Lastly, here's the Reno Office weighing in...in Chamber of Commerce-style I'd say!

This isn't usually the style of the Reno guys...they're the most conservative of the four NWS Forecast Offices that I keep tabs on.

I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt...I can't imagine how bored they must be. How can you blame them for getting excited at a glimpse of hope?

I must confess, I haven't been reading their (or any other Office's) Area Forecast Discussions since the Blocking High settled in before Thanksgiving...I'll quote Bob Dylan: "You don't need a weatherman know which way the wind blows"

So can I stop feeling guilty and look forward to putting the garden hoses away?

Fingers crossed...there's still a couple of wildfires in California that haven't been 100% contained...

What's At Stake

...last week.
It was Boreal's slog to get enough snow to sell lift tickets for Halloween. After a long, warm, uneventful Fall...Mother Nature just barely bailed out their annual Marketing Push (read Stunt...hey...whatever gets you through the night)

Saturday November 2nd
How'd that Halloween thing work out for ya, Boreal?

Well...to quote Agent 86..."Missed it by that much!"

Boreal opened at noon on Friday October 32nd according to their website. I looked at their webcam around 4PM that November afternoon and things looked pretty threadbare...

Saturday morning their website was touting: "Snowmaking continues" they'll reopen when conditions allow.

According to the Reno NWS Forecast Office's AFD, snowmaking temps will arrive overnight. Alas the moisture tied to this cold front is hanging north of the I-80 Corridor, so none of Mother Nature's Finest will accumulate. However, good cold temps will hang around for a day or two, though warming is forecast into the weekend...

Bigger Picture
If the Winter 2013/2014 is another dry one, the West will be in trouble.

The 'D' Word, drought will become a stuck record on weather reports, the Six O'clock News and The Weather Channel.

The Drought is much more serious for the Colorado River where it's been 14 years of substandard precip.

I have a special place in my heart for the Colorado River. I've hiked both the Grand Canyon from the South Rim, across the river and up the North Rim to Roaring Springs, and Havasu Canyon from the South Rim all the way through Supai, down Havasu Falls and Mooney Falls to the confluence of Havasu Creek and the Colorado.

My tally is three Grand Canyon trips and two Havasupai trips.

In the years since those adventures, I've taken two dozen fishing trips to Baja California.

The Colorado River empties into Baja's Sea of Cortez...or it used to. The mighty Colorado is so totally utilized to irrigate the Southwest, that barely any of the Colorado runs into the Cortez anymore.

The Cortez needs that water at least as much as lawns in Phoenix do.


I still haven't drawn a bead on this coming Winter...the Sun is still too quiet...

Like I said last time, I've got a bad feeling about this.

Blowin' In The Wind

Thank God! Those "triple digit temperatures" from mid-week are just a memory. I'm reminded of them when I walk by a mirror and see my bright redneck! I missed a few spots with the sunscreen spray...fortunately it's only colorful...not painful.

I'm pretty much religious about safety glasses, ear plugs, sunscreen and sports helmets...

I was chatting this morning with a new Facebook friend who lives in the California foothills, the Robbers Fire is burning some seven miles southwest of her place, as the crow flies. I watched some reports on the fire on Friday night's local 11 O'clock News. Evacuations and road closures were in effect, and a few hundred homes are threatened.

This morning, I made a point of watching the Trainwreck News stream for a Robbers Fire Update. There's good news! Though humidity is still very, very low, the temperature trending down for the next several days. Plus the wind direction has turned away from inhabited areas and the smoke is blowing away from the foothill towns now. The CalFire website has the latest details on the firefight...The Devil you say...I hope it's not an omen...the Robbers Fire is Incident #666!

I took a look the the Reno AFD. There's some of the Monsoonal moisture scudding up the eastern side of the Sierras, and afternoon thunderstorms and those troublesome outflow winds are likely south of Interstate 80. Fortunately these aren't widespread enough to meet Red Flag Warning criteria.

It occurs to me that a Wildland Fire Toolbox would come in handy going forward. I'll work on that and post it here so my Foothill and Sierra Nevada friends can keep tabs on wildfires near them or their friends.

When I'm a the DaveCave and there's a wildfire nearby I fire up my Police Scanner. Unless the fire is in my neighborhood, you can't hear the fire crews on the air, but you hear dispatch, the aircraft and their controllers, and the remaining Fire Lookouts. During Fire Season listening to the Forest Service's 8AM Radio Report is very instructional and includes a detailed Fire Weather Forecast for the area.

It still goes without saying, let's be fire safe out there!

Geekgasm

What an amazing day I had mining the internet! From the tech minutia of Formula One aero-developement (with great spy photos!) tweeted LIVE from Mugello in Italy's Tuscan countryside, to enough snarky tweets to sprain my funny bone, via some web radio, and some baseball blog fun, it sadly unraveled as the Junior Seau news unwound. Godspeed Junior. I hope his death spurs on the concussion studies of NFL players.

There's been a bunch of tech stuff streaming this week. I think it's so cool that SpaceX streamed the rocket engine test LIVE from Cape Canaveral Monday. The test went perfectly after one quick delay, and SpaceX will send their first Dragon capsule to the International Space Station later this month. Private spaceflight...I've been waiting for this since I was a kid listening to NASA space shots on a cheap transistor radio!

It's been a bad couple of weeks for offshore sailboat racing in California. The Slow Speed Chase ran afoul of shoals at the Farallones on April 13th, leaving one dead and four missing. On the morning of April 28th, the Agean went missing during the 65th Annual Newport to Ensenada Race with four souls aboard. Early speculation had the Agean tangling with a large ocean going ship.

The SoCal yacht racing deaths have been explained. Tech holds the answer. After lunch today, Latitude38 posted to Facebook the rest of the Agean story. It looks like no other vessel was involved. Agean's SPOT Messenger GPS track shows the boat was on a constant course and speed for more than three hours before crashing into North Coronado Island.

This SPOT Messenger GPS is a pretty cool gadget. A hundred bucks for the SPOT and $100/yr for the service looks reasonable to me for people who spend their time out near the edge. I haven't seen any SPOT coms on my Facebook or Twitter feeds...yet...

Jeez, SturgeUrge and I have been planning another Tomales Bay Dungeness Crab Hunt for a week now...the wind, weather and tides just won't cooperate. we're looking at after Mother's Day now...

The winds have turned blustery, and the skies have been darkening since noon today. The Monterey/SFO AFD said there was an 80% chance of rain on Tomales Bay tomorrow, with just a chance of precip here in the Inland Valley. My eye says it could rain here before morning.

Regular readers will remember Bruce Lee, the AT&T Park Red Tail Hawk. Bruce is on Twitter now. Not to be out-maneuvered, the AT&T Park Seagull signed up this week too. I expect an epic, dare I say Iconic, SnarkFest should ensue when @HawkBruce and @ATTSeagull start to tangle!

Finally, the numbers on the 2011/2012 Ski Season are coming out, and they're not good. Truckee's Local Fishwrap has the numbers from Northstar and Heavenly Valley. The two Vail-owned resorts report a 24.2% hit to skier visits from the slow starting season. How'd I know about the Sierra Sun story? They're in my Twitter feed.

Mental Health Week

My White Flag isn't bothering me as much today. The Sierra Avalanche Center warns that the Avalanche Danger is Considerable!

The rains continue unabated here at the Ancestral Digs. I've been scanning the webcams every few hours and it's raining to over 7000ft. These bands of precipitation are forecast to continue until Thursday-ish, as the Reno AFD says the snow level will rise to 7500-8000ft. With a juicy sub-tropical moisture tap, "Cold Front" is a non sequitur. Chain controls swam uphill and were lifted once the rain washed the summit clear, but not before powerlines blew down across Interstate 80 near Rainbow Road and closed the interstate for a time.

This is the big reason I fled...the Psychological Low that rain on ski hills brings. Wet enough, and long enough, it begins to become a Public Health Problem...count me out! I don't think I have the energy to deal with all the negativity that's sure to become the default atmosphere around Truckee and environs...

Down in daffodils-in-bloom-land, the rain is a much needed Blessed Event, but the Psychological Low down here isn't going to be nearly as deep or pervasive as in snow country.

@ORACLERacing cancelled shake down America's Cup AC45 racing on the Bay again today and Facebooked about it.

The San Francisco Giants are streaming their game against the Cleveland Indians from Scottsdale, Arizona...On the mend catcher, Buster Posey knocked a 6th inning homer to tie the game 2-2! Giants closer, Brian Wilson, also rehabbing last season's injuries, pitched a 1-2-3 inning with a strikeout...Springtime for the Giants is All Sunshine, All the Time so far.

I was so keen to listen to baseball today, I actually left a very interesting, technical webcast of The Flying Lap, Peter Windsor's excellent Formula One news and chat weekly. Peter's guest was Craig Scarborough, the very clever F1-Tech blogger. Sunday's Australian Grand Prix from Melbourne promises rain-induced drama, not to mention the usual Season Opening Race Drama.


After three weeks of testing in February and early March, the new cars are coming into focus. Wholesale changes to aerodynamics and exhaust gas routing have been captured on many team's race cars, and "Scarbs" covered them in detail with beautifully rendered drawings and spy photos. 


Clever aerodynamicists have reportedly resurrected the F-Duct, coupling it's actuation to the Drag Reduction System, thus leaving the driver out of the loop which is in keeping with the letter of the Sporting Regulations that scotched the F-Duct in 2010.

We can see for ourselves tonight at 10:30PM PDT when SpeedTV broadcasts F1 Practice LIVE from the Streets of Melbourne! The forecast is for "Rain all Weekend" in Melbourne, so it's bound to be extra interesting!

Like Hero Snow, Only Different

Well, I wasn't convinced that Wednesday morning's snow showers would make it to my neck of the woods, so I was pleased as punch when the flakes started falling about midnight! The scant two inches of accumulation was welcomed by all concerned...especially after the shift we endured!

At the end, the three of us had every working machine on the mountain! Next downed cat, and somebody goes home. Tuesday night is the Graveyard Mechanic's night off, so we were on our own.

It was weird...the tractors all ran...but their tillers refused to work right, or refused to work at all... no tiller...no corduroy...no joy...All in all, we lost an hour or so of productive time, so the new snow saved our butts...

The storm postponed my Reno shopping trip, it'll be much more civilized Thursday!

When I woke up tonight, I checked all my weather stuff: Remote Sensors, Webcams, forecasts, blogs and AFDs. This dearth of winter weather has sharpened my weathermania to near-OCD levels...

This week will be another dry one...February 1st is the day the Water People measure the snowpack. Much better results than January's survey, the Tahoe Basin's snowpack is up to 37% of normal.

As you can imagine, business levels are off as well. Word came down this week that our hours are getting cut back to 36 hours a week....not good, my summer travel budget is shrinking!

We'll go back to full strength once we get another blast of winter...after another week or two of Conservation Mode.

These Low Snow Conditions are tough sledding. With reduced groomable acreage, the tendency is to groom everything you've got...the better to attract customers. This desire must be balanced against conserving the piste so we can stay open until the next storm finds it's way to My Mountain.

Skiing, snowboarding and grooming all use up a little bit of piste...nothing you'd notice in a day or two. However, when it's  weeks between storms, you can't miss the signs of shrinkage.

It's Groundhog Day! Let's hope Punxsutawney Phil sees his shadow, we need six more weeks of Winter, just to catch up!

Oh Well

I should be sleeping...I'm not... call it a long nap this afternoon...

Hey, this is interesting: The Reno AFD says it could snow a little by Wednesday morning!

Now this is chilling: "Forget Global Warming-it's Cycle 25 we need to worry about"

Off I go!

Hey! It did snow. Started about 0300...Almost two whole inches by morning!

The Sun is shining in Truckee, chain controls are up on all mountain highways in the Basin.

Bedtime In the Garden of Good and Evil

All the waiting is nearly over. This afternoon's Reno AFD says the waiting for snow ends Thursday evening.

Formula One's first practice session of the first race of the 2012 Season in Australia is only 58 days away.

It's a month and a day until the San Francisco Giants' pitchers and catchers report to Spring Training.

Only four days until the San Francisco 49ers host the New York Giants in the NFC Championship Game...Winner advances to Super Bowl XLVI

Now I'm up 3:21 past my bedtime...gonna suffer tonight.

My @CorduroyPlanet twitter timeline is running about Warp 7.1 today. Lots of Giants baseball news, as the team comes to terms with it's players.

Lots of the fellow SF Giants Fans I follow are prolific Baseball Fans who tweet every move of the Giants' rivals' personnel moves, not just the Home Team news.Today is the last day of negotiations before the Arbitration Deadline. The Giants and their ace Tim Lincecum are $4 million apart...or about 20% adrift.

All the Tahoe Sierra Ski Resorts are tweeting up a blizzard of "Here Comes Winter" stuff.

I'm waiting on some Space Junk Reentry News...Confirmation of Phobos/Grunt's final resting place, and today's eminent demise of another Russian satellite, Cosmos 2176.

As with the whole Phobos/Grunt Saga, news is trickling out like molasses in January, and with all the baseball transactions, I'm bound to miss the news and Cosmos 2176's splashdown.

I won't give a damn later this week when I'm pushing newly fallen Sierra Cement around!

Must sleep NOW!

White Noise

I messed with my bedtime over my weekend...I slept overnight instead of keeping my graveyard ways. I had a pretty good "Monday" night on My Mountain last night...the snowmakers were able to fire up by 10PM. I had a little "eye trouble", and shut them for my 30 minute lunch, before I paid the price today and fell asleep before noon...

So now I'm up at 5:30, four hours ahead of schedule...there's a new noise afoot, too.

I tuned into a couple of 6 O'clock News' weather reports...the weatherdudes were a little more animated than they have been for weeks...they're talking precipitation in the 7-Day Forecast.

I looked at Reno's AFD, snowmaking looks secure for another few nights...the rain that's got the weather guessers abuzz looks to be more wish than wet spell from where I stand tonight.

Reno's NWS Office is concerned about possible Fire Weather coming up:

These are the forecasts that try men's souls...

What about the huge blocking high that's been keeping Mother Nature's Finest at bay?

Well, the Arctic Oscillation, which has been driving the big Eastern Pacific High, is trending colder...just what we want.

Local Weather Model Wrangler, TahoeWeatherDiscussion is Cautiously Optimistic that the ducks will get in line, and that Winter will arrive finally!

I looked at the Remote Sensors...our high was 10°F lower than yesterday...that won't be white noise on my Mountain tonight...it'll be the roar of Ratnik Snow Guns and the whir of fans standing in for Mother Nature...we can hang in until Pattern Change comes.

Back At It

My all too short weekend is over...I'm back on the hill at midnight. Snowmaking over my two nights off has been a frustrating business to say the least. With temps up on the Crest hanging around 50°F as I write (1:20PM), I'm encouraged by the Reno AFD that says the temps will come tonight, once the high clouds move out.

Afternoon highs will stay high, or even warm a degree or two for the next few days, but overnight lows favor will snowmaking. So, it will be tough sledding for another week. The Natives are getting restless, and rumors are flying about resorts closing, or running out of snowmaking water.

So, me and my bunker mentality are soldiering on until Winter finally begins. Signs are that that may begin in the 10 days- two weeks time frame...

There's beginning to be some buzz in the local weathergeek community about pattern change on the horizon! Sober observers are starting to see some hopeful signs in the long distance model runs, and the Arctic Oscillation is heading negative. In Europe, Winter roared in after it started off like a lamb. We're due of course, but 10-14 days is a double eternity in a La Niña year!

Tahoe Weather Discussion is leading the view to our weather horizon.

@powdiction tweeted: "Its still way out but best change I've seen in the Pacific in a long time. Possible wave train next week/weekend  weather.hawaii.edu/models..."

KTVU2's Meteorologist, Bill Martin lit up Facebook with a GFS model photo:

GFS for January 20th

I'm buoyed for sure, but I'm going against type...I'll consider the glass to be half-empty for at least another week (but getting to sleep every afternoon may end up being like Christmas Eve for an eight year old!)

Many folks forget that the seven weeks of fair weather in December and January last season, were followed by 500 inches of snowfall. The Christmas Holidays are water under the bridge, but winter may turn miraculous in due time...

Hot Dog!

Getting up for work, I looked at the remote sensors. Snowmaking tonight!

I'm pretty sure that never in my 30 years on My Mountain, have I looked forward to snowmaking so much!

Another first...the NWS has issued a Fire Weather Watch for the Sacramento Valley, Sierra Foothills, and (Gasp!) Western Slope of the Sierra Nevada Mountains...that's us!

The Weather Service says the Fire Weather Watch will last two days, thanks to Northeasterly winds, dry conditions and a lack of snow cover.

Here's where the dry conditions came from...

The AFD says we get snowmaking temps for the weekend, then it warms back up next week.

Most everyone forgot that we had seven weeks of clear bluebird weather last season followed by 500 inches of snowfall. After a slow start, The Alps are getting pounded now. Our turn is coming...a couple more weeks...c'mon, Artic Oscillation...turn over and Let the Flakes Fly Free!

Pleasantly Surprised

I was dreading what I'd find on My Mountain after my all too balmy three day weekend. Temperatures never reached the freezing level up there as high temperature records fell across the Tahoe Basin.

Local media is having a field day with the story, it's almost impossible to escape the din of this story...it's consuming everyone in the local sliding world.

It seems that I've developed a bunker mentality over December's dry days, and along with it a sort of hyper-vigilance concerning all things wet and weather.

When I got out of the car at work last night, I noticed a couple of things. It was warm, probably 40F. I carried my slicker instead of putting it on.

The second thing was weird...though it was warm, I didn't hear the sound of running water.

Afternoon temps were in the high 40's, if it had been springtime, meltwater would be running everywhere under the snowpack, and would be making a bunch of noise as it found it's way into the drainage system around the access roads and parking lots. Again last night it was quiet...too quiet.

My guess is the meltwater is going straight into the ground...it's been so dry that the ground never became saturated, hence zero runoff to hear.

Fortunately, the swing shift guys were upbeat, but realistic...bunker mentality on display...

I slowly ground my way up the shop road, now a dark brown colored melange of snow and dirt with gravel and stone "sprinkles". Once on the mountain proper, coverage was about like last week...good, not great.

For the most part, we've lost nothing since last week when we lost the top of the mountain. From about Mid-Mountain down we're holding steadfast, slowly improving what we have open. Post-Holiday crowds are one third of the Holiday Crush, so the piste isn't taking the total pounding it did over the Christmas Holidays.

Slowly I made my way around the mountain. The snow is what we call sugar now...it acts just like dry sand. Given a few hours, it will freeze to itself, but structurally, it's a far cry from fresh snow.

I was pleasantly surprised when I went to the worst spots...those high-traffic/hardly any snowmaking yet spots, where we're fighting a losing battle. I pushed bladefull after bladefull several hundred yards and spread it over the frozen meltwater "ponds" in the middle of the trail.

In the end, I made things better...we all did. The Reno AFD says snowmaking temps will return for the weekend...not a minute too soon! Real snow looks to be a couple more weeks away. We'll be doin' what we do in the meantime...

Those of you so inclined, feel free to do a Snow Dance!

Obsessed

My three day weekend ends tonight. Over my weekend, I made a conscious effort to not obsess about our weather...It turns out I obsessively avoided digging into the forecasts, webcams, and remote sensors. The truth is, it was nearly impossible to avoid the seat-of-the-pants temperature observations while walking around town. Save for the low angle of the Sun, it could have been a warm April weekend...in the afternoons anyway...

It wasn't easy avoiding the obvious...everywhere I went, total strangers couldn't wait to make weather small talk, or whine about our lack of snow...admittedly, I gave as good as I got...My Twitter stream and the TV Weather Reports trumpeted the record high temps, which the Reno AFD says will continue for another few days

My weekend wasn't short on diversions, there was some great College Football played in the various Bowl Games...the Rose Bowl was great, then faded into the background noise floor as the Fiesta Bowl went into overtime! Whatta heartbreaker for Stanford's place kicker...Ouch!

Though temps were balmy, the night time skies were problematical for astronomical observations as clouds associated with the cold fronts that didn't visit screwed up the seeing every night save for Tuesday morning.

I was up for the Armstrong and Getty Radio Show (their first day back from two weeks of Christmas Vacation) and surfing the Web for something new on Russia's Phobos/Grunt. Waddya know, a visible pass was minutes away! I popped up and threw open the front door...nothing but stars above! I pulled on some sweats and a long sleeve T-shirt and shoes, grabbed a AA Maglite, and my compass, and hit the streets.

I walked down the street a hundred yards to the neighbor's driveway where the trees didn't obscure the Southwest sky. A minute and a half later I found Phobos/Grunt speeding overhead. 71 degrees above the horizon, she was stable, and her reflected light showed no variation, she's not tumbling. Phobos/Grunt came over at Magnitude 1.3, and traveled to the SSE where she disappeared into the morning twilight. 

By most accounts, Phobos/Grunt has about ten days left in orbit. I'll fire up CorduroyPlanet's Phobos/GruntWatch next week, or when reentry looks eminent...Stay tuned!

Hot To Trot

 NOT!

It was kind of muggy today in Truckee...too warm...too gray and too overcast...thankfully, no rain fell from the clouds. My Mountain hasn't been below freezing in three nights. I'm going to work tonight loaded with trepidation. I'll keep an eye peeled for a half-full glass...

The Reno AFD says a cold front is coming to visit Friday morning...all the TV weatherpeople have been teasing rain chances almost all week. I feel their pain...

Reno says what little moisture there is to this system will stay north of Reno and Tahoe. Rain may fall as far south as Susanville and Gerlach.

I'll be remembering The Prime Directive...do no harm.

9:37AM Update:
Arrgghhhh! I won't put a gun to my temple...I won't put a gun to my temple...I won't put a gun to my temple...the wind is out of the West...still warm...

My Mountain is Totalled! Rain and fog overnight Wednesday undid twelve days of spot-on grooming...hurry Winter! Better yet....hurry freezing temps!  C'mon Arctic Oscillation....phase change...for everyone! Pleeze?

Do No Harm

First, do no harm... It's a long way from Hippocrates' Classical Athens to Captain James Tiberius Kirk's 23rd Century United Federation of Planets and The Prime Directive. Whether the founding of Western Democracy, or one of it's most fully realized Science Fiction futures, the Principal endures. As it should.

The quality of early season ski trails isn't a life and death issue the way medicine or a balky warp drive can be, but those trails are My Universe, and they do seem perilously frail, given the forecast outlook and skier interest.

This season's quiescent start to the water year is unlike any season I've experienced in my 30 years on My Mountain. KCRA3's Chief Meteorologist, Mark Finan cited the record books for his 11 O'clock News Tuesday night. Mark said in the past 100 years, 19 winters started in similar fashion. Of those 19, three finally finished above normal precipitation-wise.

From my memory, I would cite the 1990/1991 Season as most like this one. Californians will remember that winter for it's "March Miracle". The season ended with about normal precip after a slow start. I have a feeling that it was the 90/91 winter that was responsible for finally bringing snowmaking to Northern California.

So here we are tonight...My Mountain is running half of it's chairs, and one fourth of it's trails...all on 100% Man-Made Snow. The AFD's say clear weather for the foreseeable future. One side effect of the entrenched blocking high off the Pacific Coast are the Temperature Inversions plaguing the Tahoe Sierra snowmaking crews. Which brings us to last night.

I pulled into the shop parking lot at the usual hour. The compressor farm was running and there was a breeze coming from the East. I donned my slicker for the walk to the shop. This was an improvement over Sunday's shift...No wind Sunday=Inversion Layer=No Snowmaking Temps.

Snowmaking was marginal at midnight. Warmish for snowmaking, the fans and guns weren't pumping much water, hence not a lot of snow was being made. As the night continued, the breeze died down, and temps slowly rose from bottom to top (classic inversion profile) until my 2-Way crackled. Jeweler wanted my advice.

We met 10 minutes later. Jeweler was looking a little tortured, his shift was turning from bad to worse. He wanted an ally to help him justify the Shutdown Call. He made his case, and ran through his laundry list of increasing negatives. I stopped him before the bitter end. "Don't make rain" I told him. "Right" replied Jeweler. We discussed the options, and I reminded him of the Prime Directive, and said we can't afford to make a mistake we that can't recover from on that shift... making rain would be that worst case mistake. Crestfallen but slightly vindicated, Jeweler transmitted the decision to his crew and rumbled into the night.

Two and a half hours after the snowmakers went home, the east winds began to freshen and the temps plummeted into the teens. As I tiptoed about the trails, I ran through the inventory of my shifts since I started back on Friday night.

Thanks to the coordinated attack of our snowmakers and groomers, I'd watched the conditions improve every night until last night. Skier Visits are holding steady at around 1000/day. 1000 happy sliders is a lot of sharp edges scraping away our precious piste. Throw in some stiff east winds and that snowpack can shrink daily. At least we held our ground last night...we didn't improve from the previous night, but we forestalled any degradation.

So that in a nutshell is our mission for the rest of the year. Hold the line...improve wherever possible...don't make any unfixable errors, and those 1000 will tell their friends about the amazing conditions at My Mountain, and 1000 scrapers daily will come and enjoy our wares.

Looking as I always do at the remote sensors, there will be great temps tonight. The winds are up, hopefully they'll stay low enough to ward off the inversion and allow us to capitalize on what the Reno AFD says will be a couple of cold dry days.

We should do fine as long as the well doesn't run dry...but that's a story for another night

Loose Ends

Spaced Out
Time is running out for Russia's Phobos/Grunt Mars Probe...the latest attempts to contact the spacecraft have failed. Contrary to what I posted Thursday, NASA did lend an ear after all before returning it's assets to full support of the Mars Space Laboratory launch.

Today I read that the European Space Agency had to pull back to support other duties. The Russians say  that Phobos/Grunt's fuel tanks full of toxic fuel would likely burn up during reentry, now in February. Roscosmos continues to try to hail Phobos/Grunt, should they regain control, they probably will use that  control to steer the probe into a safer reentry.

USSTRATCOM is tracking the probe now. Spaceflight 101 is keeping score.

Just in
Latest orbitals have Phobos/Grunt reentry on or about January 6, 2012

WinterWatch
@kcraFinan says we set Sacramento's record high for December 2nd. The winds that blew through yesterday went on to become hurricane strength Santa Ana Winds that tore up SoCal overnight. A second wave of NE Winds came to the High Sierra today with warmer temperatures ending the around-the-clock snowmaking hopes of the resorts.

It could be worse, witness the Austrian Alps that I caught on last night's 10 O'clock News:




The AFDs aren't exactly crowing about any pattern change in the next week. While snowmaking won't be producing around the clock this week, overnight temps will allow continued whittling on the To-Do Lists.

There is a "Silver Lining" however...Before dawn next Saturday December 10th, early risers on the West Coast of North America can see a Total Lunar Eclipse! At totality, The Moon will be almost setting in the West, so it's gonna look huge!

Why is this a "Silver Lining"? Because all these astronomical wonders are always obscured by clouds in My World! Usually it'll be snowing!

Citizens Of The World!

We're all La Niña's Children now!

I noticed that the World Cup Ski Races in Val d'Isère scheduled for December 10-11, have been cancelled due to a lack of snow, and rescheduled for Tuesday-Thursday December 6-8 at Colorado's Beaver Creek.

@Liftopia linked a story about Swiss Ski Season's Start Stalled By Snow Shortage.

Here atop the High Sierra, we're woefully short on natural snow so far this season as well. Weather so far has not favored snowmaking, either. It's been the better part of two weeks now since the fans and guns ran around the clock. Wednesday I saw a couple of fans making snow at Boreal, but a look at Boreal's Webcam at 4PM showed they'd already shut down. My 2PM-ish view showed some wind...the snow looked like it was heading into the trees between trails. The nearby PWS showed peak wind gusts were into the 40mph-50mph range, on top of 18mph-20mph steady winds at the time. High Wind Warnings are up all night.

It's funny...after reading the AFDs from Reno for snowmaking, and Monterey/SFO for Tomales Bay Crab Fishing forecasts, I remembered my "new tool" for North American Precipitation Prediction, Europe-Asia Snow Cover. I wrote about it earlier in June. I took a look and a picture is worth a thousand words...

Today's picture shows Europe almost devoid of Snow Cover.

Last year looks a lot fatter...as was our early season snowpack.
 

Here they are side by side...

There's many more data points to look at but geez, NOAA doesn't make it easy to correlate all the different ocean oscillations that matter.

Big winds with cold temps finally visited the Tahoe Sierra Thursday, and snowmaking crews went to work. NOAA's Remote Data was impressive...big winds and diving temps. Ski season will begin in earnest sometime...sooner than later is my wish.

Wind In the Lodgepoles

With the wind howling this afternoon, I didn't want to have the hood of my pickup up like a sail braving the gusts, so I grabbed my camera and headed up to Donner Summit to check on snowmaking conditions. I made a loop up Old Hwy 40, East from Soda Springs up I-80 to Boreal where I turned around and retraced my route back down to Truckee.

Donner Ski Ranch needs Mother Nature's help.

Looking across Old 40, Sugar Bowl shows some very scary glaze on Mt Disney. (All the bright patches are shiny ice crusted "pseudo boilerplate" that didn't show it's shine in the photo) This snowpack is mostly what remains of the October 6 storm, and hasn't been opened to skier traffic yet. This snow has frozen and thawed several times since and was rained on last weekend before refreezing Wednesday. New snow that falls atop this glaze is going to have lots of trouble adhering to it. It's will be a natural avalanche slab-fracture waiting to happen. There's plenty of snow blowing across the ridges here too...fresh manmade snow?

Soda Springs had a lot of windborne snow moving too, but the Sun's position was not cooperating with my photography mission.

Boreal had 50-60 cars in the parking lot, assuming that maybe 20- 25 were employees' or construction workers' cars, all but one patron must have been in the lodge/bar/ski shop. The Accelerator Quad that runs to the top was on Wind Hold, I saw the one slider riding on the Castle Peak Quad.

Again, the Sierra Nevada doing it's best Himalayan Impression. Those streams of snow famously blowing from the tops of the Himalayas are powered by The Jet Stream, our are just the damn wind!

I stopped to snap Donner Lake and the barren Carson Range featuring the nearly snowfree Mt Rose.

I snapped the original Lincoln Highway below the original US 40.

The sheep were all over Donner Lake's West End Beach...and all three miles to the eastern shore.

I must confess here that all these photos were made from the comfort of the driver's seat of the car. On a few shots, dust and sand were blowing into my face and the camera upon the wind which was a steady 35mph!

High Wind Warnings across the Tahoe Basin were more than some sand in the face for these surfers on Tahoe's West Shore. I swiped the photo from KTVU 2's weatherman Bill Martin's Facebook Page.

As I write at 8PM the power is still trying to go off as it has been for more than 24 hours. The ADF says the winds will subside to a dull roar Friday afternoon, before petering out Saturday.

Up And Down

This can't be good...it's Saturday's 2:50AM PST AFD from NWS Reno:

DRY CONDITIONS WITH ABOVE NORMAL TEMPS WILL PREVAIL THRU THE REMAINDER OF THE HOLIDAY WEEKEND AS UPPER LEVEL RIDGE AXIS OVER WRN CA MOVES EAST ACROSS NV TODAY AND INTO THE ERN GREAT BASIN ON SUNDAY. AS 700 MB TEMPS SURGE FROM -1 C YESTERDAY TO +5 C BY THIS AFTERNOON THE MOST SUBSTANTIAL JUMP IN TEMPS WILL OCCUR IN HIGHER ELEVATIONS. MEANWHILE, LIGHT WINDS WITH LIMITED MIXING IN LOWER ELEVATIONS WILL YIELD A MORE MODEST RISE IN TEMPS COMPARED TO YESTERDAY. AREAS OF CIRRUS WILL RETURN TO PARTS OF ERN CA-WRN NV LATER TODAY AS THE RIDGE AXIS MOVES INTO CNTRL-ERN NV, BUT COVERAGE IS NOT EXPECTED TO BE THICK ENOUGH TO HAVE MUCH EFFECT ON TEMPS EITHER DAY THIS WEEKEND. WITH INCREASING SW FLOW ALOFT ON SUNDAY, THE INVERSION IS LIKELY TO BE WEAKER AND ALLOW FOR WARMER TEMPS IN VALLEY AREAS WHILE HIGH ELEVATION TEMPS LEVEL OFF. TEMPS IN MOST LOWER ELEVATIONS SHOULD CLIMB WELL INTO THE 60S ON SUNDAY.
ON MONDAY, THE RIDGE WILL FLATTEN IN RESPONSE TO A WEAK SHORTWAVE MOVING ACROSS THE NWRN US AND ADVANCING SOUTHEAST THRU THE GREAT BASIN. A BACK DOOR COLD FRONT WILL BRING TEMPS DOWN A FEW DEGREES COMPARED TO SUNDAY, BUT STILL WELL ABOVE LATE NOVEMBER NORMAL HIGHS WHICH ARE AROUND 50 DEGREES IN THE RENO AREA. MOISTURE WILL BE LIMITED TO A BAND OF LOW-MID CLOUDS JUST BEHIND THE COLD FRONT PASSAGE, WHICH IS EXPECTED TO BREAK UP BEFORE REACHING THE I-80 CORRIDOR. A FEW SPRINKLES MAY ACCOMPANY THIS FRONT PASSAGE FROM EXTREME NRN LASSEN COUNTY TO THE FAR NW CORNER OF NV MONDAY MORNING, BUT MEASURABLE PRECIP IS UNLIKELY SO WILL LEAVE OUT MENTION OF ANY SHOWERS SUN NIGHT OR MONDAY. MJD

The week ahead looks to be a down one for Sierra Resorts and Snowmakers. The Monterey/SFO AFD calls for mild not wild going forward, but not enough warming to qualify as a late "Indian Summer"...

Tahoe Sierra resorts need to make snow to stay open, but I fear the best they'll be able to do is hold the line...barely. There may not be enough snowmaking hours to replace the snow that melts daily...Fingers Crossed...

All Things Mars:
Somehow I missed the LIVE launch of NASA's latest Mars Mission, the Mars Science Laboratory. It roared into space atop a Saturn V rocket from Cape Canaveral Saturday at 7:02AM PST. I thought it was going up around 3PM...I must have gotten my launch times and launch windows confused...

Despite my MIA Status, MSL had a brilliant launch and left Earth's orbit, and is on course for Mars. If all goes as planned, MSL will touch down on Mars in mid-August 2012.

I love that the American Space Program brings cars along when NASA visits other worlds! Remember the Moon Buggy? The first car we sent to the Moon was a four wheel drive...Think 2-Seater Jeep with a satellite dish!

MSL is the size of an American SUV, one ton of nuclear powered, independent suspension, six wheel drive, science-doing machine with satellite dish! As an American 4X4 driver and satellite-o-phile, I couldn't be prouder...


Meanwhile back on Earth...
No contact has been made with Russia's errant Mars probe Phobos/Grunt. Ground observers report that Phobos/Grunt's orbit has stabilized so the chances of success for the next scheduled communication passes on Monday are improved.

I've found Twitter to be unrivaled in getting timely news of these spacecraft.
@PhB_Reentry will keep you up on Phobos/Grunt as it's orbit decays until it reenters in mid-January.
Russia's International News Agency RIA Novosti tweets as @riascience
@PhobosGrunt appears to be the "Official" P/G Twitter Account, charming for it's semi-butchering of the Queen's English
@ESA and @esaoperations are the European Space Agency's Twitter Streams. The ESA operates the communications outpost in Western Australia that's been "talking" to Phobos/Grunt

Here's the MSL-centric Twitter feeds that @CorduroyPlanet follows. I'll post new ones as I find them:
@MSL_101 is @SPACEFLIGHT101's MSL specific feed.
@MarsCuriosity is the probe's "Official" twitter account, from JPL I think.

That's it for business, now I can concentrate on the final weekend of the 2011 Formula One season! Thank you one and all for taking the time this holiday weekend to read CorduroyPlanet, you amaze me! Thanks so much.

12:20AM PST Sunday Update:
My look at the Remote Sensors shows temps holding at or above freezing since cooling from the afternoon highs in the high 50s to 60°F at the Snow Lab in Soda Springs. Humidity is up as has been the rule all week.

Juicy

I just love leftovers from Thanksgiving! Today I had a turkey sandwich on whole wheat for breakfast. I almost drooled the Homer Simpson donut noise...it was that good!

I snacked on some dark meat around four in the afternoon, and enjoyed a reheated turkey dinner with a new batch of braised brussels sprouts for dinner. (Thanks Sister K!) Even after sitting in a Ziploc bag for 24 hours in the garage refrigerator, the breast meat was so juicy...not to mention yummy!

Perfect Turkey Hints:
Here's the trick I use to insure a succulent turkey breast every time I roast a bird...it's all about orientation...I owe it all to Fine Cooking Magazine. I lifted the tip from one of their email newsletters in 2008. Save the link for Juicy Roast Turkey, bookmark it, you'll never roast a whole turkey any other way ever again!

Here's the secret: Roast the turkey upside down for the first hour in the oven! That's all there is to it! I know it sounds a little daunting turning a hot slippery turkey over after it's been roasting for an hour in a 325°F oven, but it's a snap...oven mitts on each hand with a wad of paper towels, and it's over and done in under 20 seconds!

I learned a new trick when turning yesterday's bird. I don't stuff the bird, I make my Cornbread and Italian Sausage Stuffing on the stovetop and finish it in the oven, so I just grabbed the bird by the body cavity and with a lift and a twist of the wrist, it was breast side up for the duration!

Here's another tip to insure a great roast turkey...buy a decent bird to begin with! I swear by Sonora's Diestel Turkey Ranch. I've never bought another turkey since the first Diestel I tried. I get mine at Lunardi's Market in Walnut Creek. Safeway has 'em too. I buy a fresh one, not frozen. They taste like turkey!

Stuffing Recipe Hints:
I prefer to use mild sausage, but I fatten up the pinch of crushed red chilies.
I prefer red and yellow bell peppers to red and green...the stuffing is much brighter without the unripe (green) bells. (I don't taste 'em later if they aren't in there either)
If you make the cornbread from the linked recipe, halve the salt.
I use white spelt flour instead of white wheat flour in the cornbread...originally because the Siskyou Wing of the family thought they had a problem with wheat gluten. When it turned out they were A-OK with the gluten, I kept using the spelt for it's extra nutty flavor.

After all was said and done, I managed not to succumb to the Turkey Coma...in fact I was still goin' strong when the 11 O'clock News came on. I watched KCRA3's newscast, and they had some footage from Sugar Bowl of holiday skiers sliding down the slopes. Except for the overcast and the flat light, it looked for all the world like late-April snow...I mean slush! The reporter doing the story said it was more springlike than holiday weather...that was one juicy looking trail!

Don't think I wasn't paying attention! I looked at the remote sensors, I didn't see enough cold temps to make snow going back for a week at least, and the last blast of cold-enough temps was accompanied by very high winds.

Looking ahead, the forecast isn't promising...I even looked at Sacramento's AFD (maybe the Chamber of Commerce-Style forecast might feature a glimmer of hope!) Reno's AFD concured, a Blocking Ridge builds in and temps trend up, up, up for the next week. Oh, and the inversion layer stays.

That's a lot of juicy afternoons on the horizon...maybe the NWS forecasters will have time to answer a phonecall and chat about the forecast models and haw the help fine tune them going forward...

A man's gotta have a dream...