Where to find a historical ski report database?

[A2thaK]

Ok, so I am looking for a database with lets say around 10 years of historical snowfall data for the major ski resorts. For instance, so I can see how much snowfall has been reported in Jan, for JH, in 2005.

Does anyone know where I could find such data?

I am an engineer nerd, and like to compile data and look at graphs, so I have been trying to create a spreadsheet with a bunch of my favorite resorts, and the reported snowfall for each month for the last 10 years or so. That way, I could create a graph with the snowfall in Jan for JH for the last 10 years, or average the 10 year data and look at every month's snowfall average over the last 10.

Thanks.

[MickeysEars]

Fill your boots http://www.jhavalanche.org/data.php

[Goatski]

could you be so kind to post your findings here??

make sure to highlight el nino years for differentiation

[A2thaK]

That is exactly what I am looking for. However, I am hoping to compile data from a bunch of resorts as well (mainly ones I visit often, or plan on visiting, trying to get one from each main area). I am looking for data for:
Taos, Wolf Creek (or Silverton or both), A-Basin (or another Summit county), Snowbird, Mammoth, Mt Baker, Whistler.

Anyone that knows where to find this kind of data on these places would be greatlt appreciated, and I WILL DEFINATELY share this info once compiled.

Thanks

[smitchell333]

Although not as packaged as you were asking for there is a ton of data here:
http://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/snow/snotel-wedata.html

and here:
http://www.nohrsc.noaa.gov/

[neckdeep]

I remember seeing this before; I thought I saw it here but no luck with the searches. It was a list of all the midsize to big ski resorts, their historic averages and then the average difference from norm during all past Nino/Ninas. It's conclusions didn't seem to match up with reality, in my opinion, because a lot of its data was derived from ski area reports, which as we all know, tend to get padded during lean years. Ski areas also count early snow that melts off in its annual totals.

[pappag]

Here's all your historical data going back to 1995:
http://webpages.charter.net/tcrocker818/snowrpts.htm

[Adamantium]

Here's all your historical data going back to 1995:
http://webpages.charter.net/tcrocker818/snowrpts.htm

Seconding this. If you're looking to draw conclusions about snowfall patterns at different resorts based on history, that is the site you want. He's done it already with 40+ years of data. The front page is bestsnow.net

[neckdeep]

Yes, this is it. Dude even specifically states Targhee sees little variance through Nina/Nino which is just dead f'in wrooooong! The last five years, 3 Ninas and 2 Ninos. The Ninos were 300 incher suckfests and the Ninas were truly epic 550-600 inchers. A variance of nearly 100%. Plus, the stats don't suggest anything about quality of snow, how the Ninas were cold yet wet, with many knee deep dumps of 5% pow etc, how Ninos tend to have have long dry periods and meltouts and warm storms with poor crystal growth. Simply does not reflect the conditions on the ground (and let me tell ya, we saw plenty of the ground during the last Nino). Just plain wrong as far as the Ghee is concerned. I'm sorry but local knowledge based on first hand observation trumps abstract stats derived from Targhee's marketing department. Shit, Targhee is one of the only resorts to face directly west into the afternoon sun and we can loose loads of snow during Nino warmups but these stats don't reflect that. Last two Ninos the lower mountain never filled in then it turned into a turdcicle by March. Quantitative analysis pretty much misses the qualitative element and that is what you really want to know about, the total overall QUALITY OF THE SEASON.

[Adamantium]

Yes, this is it. Dude even specifically states Targhee sees little variance through Nina/Nino which is just dead f'in wrooooong! The last five years, 3 Ninas and 2 Ninos. The Ninos were 300 incher suckfests and the Ninas were truly epic 550-600 inchers. A variance of nearly 100%.

That's just a 5 year sample. If he drew the conclusion that Targhee sees little variance (in snowfall) from El Nino/La Nina, it's from the 40 or so years of data he has to look at. Sample size and all that jazz.

[neckdeep]

True but that also brings up the valid question of how relevant 40 year old data is to a climate in change. What more can I say, ummmm.... warm is warm and warm ain't good for keeping snow on the hill. Around here, Ninos tend to be warm and sunny, Ninas tend to be cool, wet and cloudy....figure it out for yourself. And for his assertion to be so totally wrong even just five years does raise questions. Five consecutuve years. Ten years really...the best four seasons were Ninas, the lamest three were Ninos. Nothing personal, but the author's data has led him astray for him to specifically say there is no impact here.

[Adamantium]

True but that also brings up the valid question of how relevant 40 year old data is to a climate in change. What more can I say, ummmm.... warm is warm and warm ain't good for keeping snow on the hill. Around here, Ninos tend to be warm and sunny, Ninas tend to be cool, wet and cloudy....figure it out for yourself. And for his assertion to be so totally wrong even just five years does raise questions. Five consecutuve years. Ten years really...the best four seasons were Ninas, the lamest three were Ninos. Nothing personal, but the author's data has led him astray for him to specifically say there is no impact here.

If you read his analysis, you'll see he never says there is "no impact" at Targhee. He classifies Targhee in the "minimally impacted" category. Sifting through the numbers, Targhee is near the edge of that category, and Jackson is listed as "strongly favored" by La Niña. Targhee's monthly correlation to La Niña is 13% (Jackson is 15%) but the seasonal number is only 26% (Jackson is 47%). You could make an argument that his numbers show he should be putting Targhee in the at least "mildly favored by La Niña" category.

But the El Niño/La Niña correlation discussion isn't as simple as "La Niña=above average, thus we claim a connection." These events have a relative strength number that meteorologists use, so he compares the strength of a particular La Niña year with how much a particular area deviates from their average snowfall in that year.

As for the last 5 seasons, look at those numbers in context. The seasonal average he has for Targhee is 472 and the standard deviation is 97. A season at 550 isn't even a full standard deviation above the average. You could claim that 40 year old data isn't relevant due to climate change (though that would be a bold claim and hard to show) but then you're left with what, the last 5-10 years as your history? Then your standard deviation would be much higher (due to the small sample size) and you couldn't make any strong claims about seasons in the 300's or 600's, because they'd all probably be well within 1 standard deviation.


In general, I think people are often quick to jump on him and attribute stronger statements to him than he has actually made. He is not trying to be the end-all be-all of snow information. He's using the tools he has (statistical analysis) on the most readily available data (snowfall data) to draw what conclusions he can. In the interest of full disclosure, the author of bestsnow.net is my father so my opinion on the site is biased.

[A2thaK]

To be clear, I am mainly focusing on monthly amounts, for several regions of the country. My main objective is not an el nino/la nina comparison. I guess I am just anxious waiting for snow, and all I think about is snow, so I decided to track monthly snowfall and base data for the last few years as well as current amounts. It will be mainly a comparison of area vs. monthly snowfall, as well as to track base depth and snowfall for each individual resort. Not much conclusions or anything to be drawn, just for entertainment purposes to focus my snow driven energy.

So I can be like, well, based on historical data, late feb should be best here. Early jan should be best here. I know...pretty common sense or objective or whatever the correct wording for take it with a grain of salt type stuff but I like spreadsheets and graphs.

[Adamantium]

Apologies for the thread derail A2thaK. What you described is pretty much exactly what bestsnow.net tries to do.

[neckdeep]

And as the first major system of the winter transits the lower 48, it follows the classic El Nino route. Dumps massive in the Sierras and is projected to track right across the four corners region and leave the northern rockies high and dry. Gee....sure is comforting to know that its all just a coincidence that its an El Nino season. Stats are so comforting...

Update: two weeks later and its too warm to snow. We've caught one in four storms so far... yep, pretty lame so far..about the lamest early season I've suffered through...good thing its just a coincidence and Nino doesn't affect the Tetons.

[neckdeep]

Bumped. Just to laugh at the lameness of this spring and again point out that this database really is crap as far as the Tetons are concerned. This makes four consective Ninos that ranged from mediocre to complete shit and three consecutive Ninas that rocked. Nino = 300 to 450 inches; Nina = 450-600 inches - that is a bit more than "minimally impacted".

[neckdeep]

Bumped again a year later to point out that the "minimal impact" of this year's Nina meant an incredible season for everyone who didn't have a pass at Taos and record snow levels at multiple resorts across the West. Tetons got over 600, Wasatch 700....that's some minimal impact!

[pappag]

Link above is dead... try http://bestsnow.net/ for historical snowfall data.

[Like a Boss]

^^^^Greatest website ever. What's the over/under on Vail's 2011-2012 total? 225? I'm buying the under.

[hutash]

Of people are still looking, PM TonyC here, or at firsttracks.com or at the Mammoth forums. He has a pretty deep data base, certainly deep then this seasons snow pack thus far.

[yoshakezula]

Check this site out:

http://snowbase.kennychan.co/

It's cool to see how all the summit county resorts were below average in base depth this year until the last month or snow when it dumped

[TonyC]

I just stumbled across this thread.
1) A2thaK or anyone else can order the raw snowfall data for personal use here: http://50.87.144.177/~bestsnow/advtsnet.htm
2) neckdeep stated in 2009 that of the past 5 years there were "3 Ninas and 2 Ninos." 2007-08 was strong La Nina, 2004-05 and 2006-07 were El Nino for half or less of the season. The other 2 years had no strong El Nino or La Nina months. I use the MEI table here: http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/people/klaus...MEI/table.html Recent Targhee experience does conform to neckdeep's observation, big snow in strong La Ninas of 2007-08 and 2010-11, well below average during the El Nino of 2009-10 as well as the partial El Ninos of 2004-05 and 2006-07. The partial La Nina of 2011-12 was not much better though.
3) I'm sure neckdeep is one of those who believe correlations are not necessarily the best way to analyze El Nino/La Nina. Many meteorologists believe that only the stronger episodes have a material impact. Thus we should only examine snowfall during the months with the highest and lowest MEI readings. The problem here is that when I first collected this data in 2007 there had been only 3 La Nina seasons in the past 30 years, and only a few areas had data from the La Ninas of the early and mid-1970's, Targhee not among those. With the 2 strong La Ninas of 2007-08 and 2010-11 there is now more data, so I've revised my tables to show snowfall percents of normal for strong El Nino months (MEI>.750) and strong La Nina months (MEI<-.750). These columns are blank for areas with less than 22 months of data, which at a minimum would be all La Nina months December-March since 1988.
http://50.87.144.177/~bestsnow/El_Nino.htm
http://50.87.144.177/~bestsnow/La_Nina.htm
http://50.87.144.177/~bestsnow/Neutral_areas.htm
4) What about Targhee specifically? As noted above it was already a borderline case, and the 2010 and 2011 seasons moved it into the mildly favored by la Nina category. We also know now that Targhee averaged 97% of normal snowfall during 61 strong El Nino months and 113% or normal during 31 strong La Nina months. I'm sure that 97% surprises some people, particularly since Targhee's only seasons under 300 inches were the El Ninos of 1986-87 and 1991-92. However there are several above average El Nino years: 557 inches in 1977-78, 540 inches during the record El Nino of 1982-83, 553 inches during 1992-93, 553 inches during 1994-95 and 522 inches during 2002-03. During the second highest El Nino of 1997-98 Targhee got its exact average of 472 inches.
5) As we all know numbers are not the whole story.

Targhee is one of the only resorts to face directly west into the afternoon sun and we can loose loads of snow during Nino warmups but these stats don't reflect that. Last two Ninos the lower mountain never filled in then it turned into a turdcicle by March. Quantitative analysis pretty much misses the qualitative element and that is what you really want to know about, the total overall QUALITY OF THE SEASON.

I've only skied Targhee a few days, but it's obvious that the snow stays nice when it's cloudy and not so much if it's sunny. I have no idea if there's more sun in El Nino years with average or better snowfall, such as those 10-20 years ago.
6) Even though temperatures over the past 20 years have been warmer than during the previous 20 years, there is absolutely no trend in snowfall among North America's ski areas during that time.

I have this broken down by 8 regions and the message is the same in each of them.