Wintry opening day at Mad River Glen followed by an ugly looking thaw early next week

On the whole, the outlook looks somewhat positive through the winter solstice but it is weighed down substantially because of a very bad looking 48-hour stretch early next week. In the mean time, temperatures have remained below freezing and the mountains have picked up small amounts of fluffy snow this week. The arctic front late next week appears more substantial and includes a more well defined, albeit weak, area of low pressure that is expected to move from near Buffalo to Boston during the course of the day Friday. This is not an entirely bad forecast track at all for northern Vermont though models are suggesting that much of the snow that falls from this will be over the same area that maxed out on the last storm and not necessarily over northern Vermont. There are some old weather forecasting rules that are somewhat violated by this notion and would instead have us getting a 2-5 inch snow Friday but if we are to enslave ourselves to model output then the MRV would see a 1-2 inch event. It's pretty close yet again and worth watching the radar on Friday but it's a good bet that places a little farther south outperform the MRV again.

Opening day Saturday appears to be cold and blustery but not overwhelmingly so. Winds are likely to be in the 10-20 mph range for much of the day with clouds and some snow flurries to start and some sunshine and better visibility to finish. That good visibility should continue into Sunday and will include calm winds (until very late in the day) and temperatures rebounding toward 30 in the afternoon following a 5 degree morning.

There's no getting around the outlook for late Monday into Tuesday. It is an ugly looking torch and once it gets going, we can rest a little easier at missing out on the goodies December 1st and 2nd because much of that will be gone by Wednesday. Temperatures will rise into the 40's by late Monday, accompanied by some rain during the evening and those above-freezing temperatures will persist Monday night into Tuesday, even rising into the 50's during the day. Occasional rain, high dewpoints and a mild wind will do considerable damage to early season snow cover and leave lots of bare ground showing by the time colder air arrives Wednesday morning. The cold air late in the week looks somewhat intense and should be accompanied by snow showers, but we will have work to do in terms of recovering what will be lost.

The better part of the outlook involves the stretch beginning after the coming thaw December 11th and persisting at least through the solstice. Though there continues to be an incredible amount of disagreement in the forecast ensembles, none of the scenarios involve a torch. The American ensembles indicate a simply beautiful looking weather pattern including a nice ridge in the jet stream over western Canada and an undercutting sub-tropical jet stream (split flow) which would keep the storm threat alive. The European Ensembles want no part of any ridge in western Canada and show a tighter Pacific jet stream. This version would certainly be milder than the picture being painted by the American ensembles but not overwhelmingly warm and still potentially stormy If I had a concern during these 10 days, it involves a potential storm around December 13-14 amplifying too aggressively in the southern plains. Such an occurrence reduces the snowfall potential and raises the mixed precipitation potential.