awesome skiing at Alta yesterday

this is what it was like...

That's a lot of snow!  Has it really been a year since you went skiing there?  Wow--time flies! 

It was a beautiful 70 degrees here today. :-) 

Nice.
Back when I was in college, we used to do a lot of weekday skiing at Loveland. Back then, lift tickets were $8, and we could go two, sometimes three days a week.
By the way, I am certain that the coldest place in the lower 48 is the basin at the top of the #2 lift at Loveland.
I also like A-Basin and Breckenridge.
One of my best ever days way a midweek day at Breck.
There were maybe five other people there, so I pretty much had the mountain to myself.
I ran into the same guy a few times, and we would alternately cruise and race down the runs.
What a day.

Oh yeah...after I wrote that, I wondered if it wasn't this past spring you posted those great pictures.  :-) 

batsbrew


this is what it was like...

Why batsbrew, why do you torture me this way?

Record Lowest Temperatures by State

State Temp.°F   Temp.°C Date               Station Elevation

Colorado –61 –52 Feb. 1, 1985 Maybell 5,920

N. Carolina –34   –37       Jan. 21, 1985          Mt. Mitchell 6,525


notice the elev!
LOL

so, the elevation really doesn't come into play as much as the event itself.....


believe me, beech is only 5500'...

and alta, is at 11,000'
and i go there all the time.

north carolina was colder.

oh gosh, i've been up at sugar mountain when it was 15 below plus a 30mph wind chill factor 
(makes it about -46F)
http://www.nws.noaa.gov/om/windchill/index.shtml


sugar was one of my old haunts when i lived in charlotte nc (1990-2000)

hawksnest, beech, sugar, then up to winterpark WV, and the longer trips to Snowshoe.

well, i don't know about 'invented'

hehehe

but utah does have the claim 'greatest snow on earth'

it's on my truck's license plate!
LOL



The Facts Behind the Claim
“Greatest Snow on Earth®”

It’s called orographics: 
Winter trade winds push clouds full of moisture east from the Pacific Ocean, across California and Nevada and to Utah. As the clouds move across the desert, the heat bakes out much of their moisture. When the clouds meet Utah’s Rocky Mountains, the remaining moisture rapidly cools and condenses, and precipitation hits our Utah ski resort terrain with a “mother lode” of deep, white powder snow that’s particularly light and dry.

There’s another weather element that feeds Utah’s love affair with the white stuff.
 TV station News 4 Utah’s Chief Meteorologist Dan Pope says, “We have something that no other ski location in the world has - The Great Salt Lake Effect. Often the Great Salt Lake is much warmer than the bitter cold air following a cold front. The lake releases water into the air that then rises into clouds of snow, producing squalls on its eastern flanks. These squalls contain some of the world’s lightest, fluffiest and driest snow ever produced, and it falls in feet – not inches – on our Wasatch Mountains.”

 As clouds draw moisture up from the Great Salt Lake, they “recycle” themselves for several days in the surrounding mountains. Utah ski enthusiasts often get a “one-two” (or a “three-four”) punch of powder, causing many local employees to call in sick with the “powder flu.”

 Editor in Chief of Skiing Magazine, Marc Peruzzi , simply stated, “That is why we test fat skis in Utah.”

Snow is a type of precipitation within the Earth's atmosphere in the form of crystalline water ice, consisting of a multitude ofsnowflakes that fall from clouds. Since snow is composed of small ice particles, it is a granular material. It has an open and therefore soft structure, unless packed by external pressure. Snowflakes come in a variety of sizes and shapes. Types which fall in the form of a ball due to melting and refreezing, rather than a flake, are known as graupel, with ice pellets and snow grains as examples of graupel. Snowfall amount and its related liquid equivalent precipitation amount are determined using a variety of different rain gauges.




water content.




New snow commonly has a density of around 8% of water. This means that 33 centimeters (13 in) of snow melts down to 2.5 centimeters (1 in) of water.[39] Cloud temperatures and physical processes in the cloud affect the shape of individual snow crystals. Highly branched or dendritic crystals tend to have more space between the arms of ice that form the snowflake and this snow will therefore have a lower density, often referred to as "dry" snow. Conditions that create columnar or plate-like crystals will have much less air space within the crystal and will therefore be denser and feel "wetter".


that's what makes snow 'heavy sierra cement' or 'champaign powder' or 'cold smoke'.




wiki is your friend.

The only snow we get where I live is horrible brown slush,   I'm sure it falls like that.

I have too much respect for gravity to ever try skiing. Plus the bad knees, ankles, etc. Old sports injuries, you know.
Looks like fun, though.

Karyn


The only snow we get where I live is horrible brown slush,   I'm sure it falls like that.

I think I tripped over the highest mountain in Lincs, but it may have been a kerb and technically it may even be that part of Lincs, they tried to call Humberside once so that might not even count.

I think Eddie the Eagle probably trained on the notorious Lincolnshire slopes, no?...

Decent snow would be wasted on us.  We only need a couple of inches to paralyse the transport infrastructure for a day or two in order to moan about it for three months after until we get the next flurry in April.

Well my closet decent Ski resort (Brianhead, UT) is opening most of their lifts Friday. Time to wipe the dust off the board and gas up the truck.