Greetings and welcome!
We are under a winter storm watch at the moment and people are getting all excited. I’d love it if it works out the way that the forecasts have it set up.
Let’s start at the beginning…
When we were out for Sunday Funday I got a look at some trails around the area. The difference is the trail base between Friday and Sunday was night and day. We had some 40s over the weekend including about 45 for Sunday. Shaded spots fared ok, but sunny spots took a beating or opened up to the ground. I was not happy to see that.
Anyway, we got a little snow yesterday evening. It ended up to be a little under an inch.
The next round of snow comes tonight when they are expecting around 3″. That round of snow looks like it will be focused a little farther south than we would like, but 3″ isn’t too far fetched. Follow that up with another inch of snow tomorrow.
The main event is shown from Wednesday night until Thursday afternoon. That one they are expecting 8-10 plus inches of snow, and while it is falling, up to 45mph winds. I would not want to travel Wednesday night in those conditions.
This set of storms has been in the news for a few days, and as mentioned, people are getting all excited. Making fun of that, one friend named it the Snowpocalypse. Nooice.
The storm has been very consistent among the various forecast models over the past 4 or 5 model runs. At that point forecasters are putting the chances of snow at 90 and 100%.
Here is a photo of yesterday’s noon news snowfall graphic.
And here is a picture of this morning’s.
As the storm got closer they tempered their expectations a little bit. I expect to see more of that.
Do I believe it? No. Not those numbers anyway.
My mind keeps flashing back to when I worked in Wausaukee. We were expecting 8-12″ plus of snow overnight and we really needed it for the trails. It was a sure thing. I was driving into work the next morning looking at the bare ground and the big storm moving off to the east. I was pretty crabby that day.
The point is, I don’t believe it until I can roll in it. Will I get gas and supplies today? Yup. Check over the snowblowers and generators? Yup again. Turn the snowmobiles around in the garage? Check. What I don’t want to do is get into the mindset that anything under a foot of snow is a disappointment. The odds of 8-10 are a lot higher than the odds of 10-15″. I do think that it will snow and we will get a healthy dose of it. My expectations are just a little lower than current forecasts.
If we do get enough snow to ride we will want to do it sooner than later. There is a storm in the forecast models for Monday that is a really strong storm. It has the lowest central pressure that I recall seeing this winter and a Gulf of Mexico moisture root. The hook is that all of that red and yellow… yeah.. that ain’t snow.
Do I believe that one? Yes and no. After one disappointment following another this season it is entirely believable that we would get heavy rain right after we could ride again. The no comes in that the forecast almost always changes after a big storm.
At the end of my update I think that the takeaway is this. It is very likely that we will be able to ride this weekend, just don’t be too disappointed if our 16.5″ of snow turns into 8-10. That and if it does come, don’t dawdle getting into the saddle. That Monday storm is a dark shadow looming over the whole party.
I will update once the snow starts falling.
Have a good Tuesday and thank you for visiting!
RJB