Meadows Blog

Delightfully Brutal Storm

1/18/2012 11:08:00 AM by Meadows Crew in Connection, Weather Blog | 3 comments

Apparently all those snow dances are working - and the prayers are being answered all at once. The first major storm of this season is blasting Mt. Hood with an abundance of snow - more than five feet from Saturday through Wednesday. The powder skiing and riding was wonderful through Tuesday, and even Wednesday morning - but now the nastiness of the storm is upon us.

High winds and warming temperatures are wreaking havoc on the mountain. The winds affect our lift operations and the rising temperatures increase the the avalanche hazard. It's pretty simple physics - take four feet of really light powder, and then place a heavier layer of more densely saturated snow on top of it and you have the makings for some sliding.

We also want to alert you to the danger of deep snow tree wells. Ride with a buddy - and avoid these powdery traps.

Needless to say we will be affected during the height of this storm, but we'll take it. Looking forward the freezing levels and winds drop, and we'll more than double our base setting us up for some terrific conditions for riding! Keep an eye on our conditions page and if you haven't already you really should subscribe to our daily snow report. It gives you great information on what to expect each day.

For now, enjoy the video Pierce from mComm shot Tuesday - the day we received 31 inches of powder. Storm riding at its best!

 

3 Comments

  1. Brian

    January 18, 2012

    What happened to HRM? Trees down?

    Meadows: Wednesday we had Avalanche Mitigation in progress on terrain serviced by HRE which would delay operating that lift, so traffic was routed to the main lot (instead of parking at HRM.) As temperatures warmed and the snowpack became heavier, we had concerns about slope stability at HRM and opted not to open the lift. We continued to monitor slope stability in that area and the rest of the resort as well, in case more lift closures were necessary for safety reasons.
    Thursday HRM was reopened.

  2. Ole Timer

    January 18, 2012

    Great 5 runs. Too bad you can't open on time so we can use the only good 2 hours of the day.

    Meadows: If you're speaking about Wednesday, we opened Mt. Hood Express at 9:01 AM, and Easy Rider at 9:12 AM. At 10:01 AM Star opened and Stadium followed at 10:07 AM. This is extraordinary considering the amount of snow we had received in the previous 24 hours and the weather we were experiencing. Yes we strive to open every lift on time, but in a storm such as this we do our best to get what is humanly possible open, as quickly as possible. Timberline didn't even operate Wednesday (all lifts closed.) Mt. Bachelor is having similar storm conditions today and they also closed. Our dedicated lift maintenance crew which works tediously and efficiently to maintain and open our lifts doesn't seek out or ask for credit. But comments such as this really shows how under appreciated they are.

  3. Larry

    January 19, 2012

    Why does Heather say waiting for more snow?

    There must be some other reason?

    Meadows: We'll be able to update that message once our patrol can assess conditions in the canyon. We need to build the snow bridges to cover the creeks at the bottom of the canyon, but avalanche hazards have been too high to take a cat into the canyon at this point. We'll have a much clearer picture of the what needs to be done, and a time frame for getting it done once patrol can assess.

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