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I guess most people look at snow depth charts for an idea of how good the cover is — or might be on some date or other. Looks like there’ll be about a metre at Spencers Creek (near Charlotte Pass, half way between Perisher and Thredbo), so there should be decent cover and good skiing. But it’s not quite that simple. A metre at Spencers Creek in late June probably means extensive fresh cover; a metre in late September more . . . → Read More: When does our snow fall? 
The famous spag plot of the NCEP ensemble of the GFS model is back on line, and is was suggesting significant action around these dates after some pretty warm weather next week. The season peak is close. (The peak depth at Spencers Creek is usually in the last week of August or the first week of September. The latest peak on record was 206.5 cm on 5 October 1971.) Update (28/8): This system has drifted later and all but died . . . → Read More: 4-5 September 2013 
The Bureau of Meteorology has completed its re-work of design rainfall intensities for Australia. These things are used all over the place in engineering design, from sizing that new drain the council just put in your street, to sizing the humongous pumps some coal miner needs to keep their pit dry; from inputs to the flood study keeping development off a hazardous floodpain, to choosing a new dish for your telco’s satellite comms. The previous design rainfalls were produced by . . . → Read More: New design rainfalls for Australia Ok, a touch late, but there’s obviously another very similar series of fronts passing through over this interval, for perhaps 40 cm total gain — which would neatly take us up to our season peak prediction… [I see the ECMWF sampler is off-line. I hope they haven’t finally noticed they’ve been providing it for free and turned it off.] Update (22/8): Both Spag and ECMWF are back up; joy. And, err, and 169.9 cm measured on Tuesday … what a . . . → Read More: 18-22 August 2013 
What percentage of winter precipitation falls as snow in Australian snowfields? One thing that’s obviously different so far about season 2013 (vs say the miserable 2006) is the proportion of rain vs snow. By the end of July there’d been nearly 500 mm of winter precipitation at Thredbo Village for just 53 cm of snow on the ground at the nearby Spencers Creek snow course. How unusual is that? Information on precipitation type in the Australian snowfields is surprisingly scarce. . . . → Read More: Percent snow According to ECMWF, another very similar series of fronts looks like sweeping through next weekend (that 7 day winter pattern). At least another 30 cm over 4 days. Late update: …and the weekend after. The typical 7-10 day winter pattern now seems well established, if rather late. Outcome: ~30 cm gain at Spencers Creek; prediction timing a little early (again!); pretty good I think … score 8/10. |
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