Hanscom-Kelner Tours

In modern times, it is possible to get a good deal of beta for ski touring from various apps and online sources, but back in the day, the only option was the printed guidebook.

For what we call the central and northern Wasatch Today, the Dead Sea Scrolls of the Utah Backcountry is Wasatch Tours, Volume 2 – The Northern Wasatch by Dave Hanscom and Alexis Kelner.  

Dave Hanscom is a legend in the Utah Nordic Community who has been heavily involved with The Utah Nordic Alliance (TUNA) and Wasatch Citizens Series nordic race series.  I first met Dave in Japan in 1998 when the two of us were sent to the Hakuba Valley as part of the Salt Lake Olympic Committee advance team.  I liked him immediately and still enjoy running into him from time to time at Round Valley. 

I have never met Alexis Kelner, but his research on Utah ski history provided important material for my book.  The Wasatch Mountain Club conservation award is named in his honor, which tells you that he has been a stalwart for preservation of Utah's public lands.  

Wasatch Tours is not not a book for those who tour with beef boots and heavy metal skis.  It was written at a time when leather boots and long skinny skis were the norm.  You won't find a ski-descent rating system or talk about whippet poles.  What you will find are great photos and history and information about nearly every canyon from Lone Peak to Ben Lomond.  

Most importantly, they cover an abundance of low- and mid-elevation touring possibilities that in recent years have been hard to ski.  

Pull out Wasatch Tours and you'll find information on tours in City Creek Canyon, the Foothills, Emigration Canyon, Parleys Canyon, etc.  Some of these tours are cross-country adventures.  Some require navigating through impenetrable scrub oak.  One of my favorite and often used quotes comes from Hanscom and Kelner's description of the Thomas Fork tour in Neff's Canyon:

"About 0.75 mile beyond this point, to the right of the jeep road, is a seemingly impenetrable oak grove located atop an ancient alluvial fan.  Leave the road here and head south almost directly into the grove. No ski area developers have cleared the willows and oak, so considerable ingenuity and determination are requires to get through the rush.  True cross country touring is, after all, a character developing and strengthening form of recreation."

I think of this quote frequently , including today as we exited at the end of our tour today, although the vegetation on our route was somewhat penetrable. 

So Cottonwood Refugees, think beyond the usual tours and take advantage of the remarkably deep snowpack we have with a low angle sun.  Things will be changing in the coming weeks as the sun angle increases.  

Old School Snow Studies

This month marks the 100th anniversary of the October 1919 issue of Monthly Weather Review, which included a whole slew of short articles on snow and its impacts.  Lovers of snow and history can check it out at https://journals.ametsoc.org/toc/mwre/47/10.

Included is a map of the average annual snowfall of the United States, 1895–1914 by C. F. Brooks based on observations from 2,000 stations.  My view is it's a pretty good synthesis, especially over the eastern 2/3 of the U.S.  The "natural advantages" of the Cottonwood Canyons, remain undiscovered.

Source: Ward (1919)

There's also an article on a "improved form of snow sampler," which is basically a snow coring tube similar to those still in use today.

Source: Kadel (1919)

At the time, Monthly Weather Review often included abstract reprints from other journals.  The issue includes this synopsis of the snow climate of the European Alps by M. E. Benevent.

"The region naturally falls into two main subdivisions — the North-Alps, whose precipitation is controlled by oceanic influence, and the Southern Alps, controlled by Mediterranean influence.  

Well, that's a start. 

I wonder how scientists will look back on today's atmospheric research in 2119?  I suspect that most of our work, while enabling the progression of science to where it will be in 2119, will be subsumed by newer and better studies that build upon the knowledge we create today.  Scientists will look back and see the value, but only a small percentage of papers published today will have significant value.  If you think about it, that is actually a very optimistic view of the future of atmospheric research.  

The End of an Era

Today marked the last day of lift served skiing at Alta and the end of an era for the resort as General Manager Onno Wieringa retires after this season.

Onno was a strong supporter of weather research and forecasting efforts in Little Cottonwood Canyon and the Wasatch Range.  Alta was the first ski area to begin supplying weather observations to the "Utah Mesonet," predecessor to MesoWest (special thanks as well to Alta Ski Patrol, especially Howie Howlett and Titus Case).  Before the advent of MesoWest, weather observations were sparse to non-existent across most of the Wasatch Range.  Today, we get observations from nearly all of the ski resorts and they make a huge difference.  The Alta-Collins site, in particular, provides very high quality snowfall and snow water equivalent measurements that are used by everyone who forecasts in the Wasatch Mountains including the Utah Avalanche Center, National Weather Service, UDOT, utahskiweather.com, opensnow.com, and wasatchsnowforecast.com.  During storms, I probably look at those observations 50 times a day (even though they come in only once an hour!).

Onno also generously provided the wonderful snow observations collected by Howie, Titus, and the Alta Ski Patrol to develop algorithms for forecasting snow density during winter storms in the Wasatch Range, observations that we ultimately used not only for science, but also to set the record straight on why Utah snow is so great (er, Alta snow) in an article for the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society and also my book, Secrets of the Greatest Snow on Earth.

Much thanks to Onno for all he has done for the weather forecasting community of Utah.

Onno's retirement isn't, however, the only one at Alta this year.  The Supreme Chair is being replaced (as is Cecret) with a high-speed quad that will run from near Alf's Restaurant.  If I remember right, the old triple was the Germania triple prior to the installation of the Collins high-speed quad, so it has a long history at Alta.

In my view, a perfect closing day is sunny, warm, and corn filled and that was the case today, and the Frank World Classic really packed them in.  You don't see lines like that for Wildcat every day.

I elected to lap Collins.  I missed out on the Frank debauchery (such a shame), but did enjoy some entertainment at times from Collins.

Looking forward to the Frank YouTube video...

Honoring Joanne Simpson

Source: USA Today

Given that today is International Women's Day, I'd like to take a few moments to honor a pioneer in meteorology, Joanne Simpson.  

Joanne was the first woman to earn a Ph.D. in meteorology and the first woman elected President of the American Meteorological Society.  She was also a winner of the Rossby Medal, the highest award given by the American Meteorological Society, which is "presented to individuals on the basis of outstanding contributions to the understanding of the structure or behavior of the atmosphere."

A comprehensive biography of Joanne's life by John Weier is available at the NASA Earth Observatory web site.  It is well worth a read (be sure to drag or click down through the various sections).  He notes that after graduation, she was repeatedly turned down for a job because of her gender.  She eventually took a position at the Illinois Institute of Technology, followed by tenures at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, UCLA, NOAA, the University of Virginia, and finally NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.  As described by John Weier, her move from Virginia to NASA goddard was at least partially related to the fact that women faculty were held in low regard, but NASA provided a "far more favorable environment in which to work."  

Joanne's contributions to meteorology span cloud processes and deep convection, weather modification, and tropical meteorology, and include over 190 authored or co-authored articles. 

Joanne died in 2010 at the age of 86.  Additional tributes to her are available from the American Meteorological Society and Boston Globe.  

Blast from the Past: Ski Magazine February 1978

Thanks to Dr. Google, every now and then I run across some great old article that puts a smile on my face.  Recently, I ran across the article provided at the bottom of this post, which appeared in Ski Magazine in February 1978 and examines both the avalanche history and its famed reputation for powder at Alta.  I especially liked that it referred to a quote from Ed LaChapelle in a 1962 Forest Service report on Alta snow, which I also used a portion of for my book Secrets of the Greatest Snow on Earth:

"The highest snow densities in terms of grams of water content per cubic centimeter of snow are found at Alta...This reflects a fact known to the experienced snow ranger but usually ignored by the average skier: the best deep powder skiing is not found in the lightest snow, but rather in snow with enough 'body' to provide good flotation for the running ski"

For those of you who want further context, the Forest Service report, entitled The Density Distribution of New Snow, is available online from the Marriott Library (they are always on top of things!).

The report compares 24-hour snow densities from avalanche study sites at Alta, Stevens Pass (WA), Berthoud Pass (CO), Squaw Valley (CA), and Girdwood (AK).  The surprising finding of this work was that the mean snow density at Alta was higher than any of those sites, hence Ed's comment above that the highest snow densities were found at Alta.

That finding has always been perplexing to me, particularly Alta having higher snow densities than Stevens Pass and Squaw Valley, and, although Ed attempts to explain it, I never found his reasoning in that article to be all that compelling.  Altitude, wind exposure, and many other factors can influence snow-density measurements and I've always wondered if the data he used was representative of the general snow characteristics at each site.  At Alta, for example, one would find higher snow densities if data was collected in an area affected by wind transport and related densification.

Nevertheless, I always liked the latter part of the quote about the best deep powder skiing not being found in the driest snow, but rather in snow with enough body to provide good floatation.  That has always been my experience.  In my view, great powder skiing is found in snow that is "stacked" right, with the low-density stuff sitting on top of the high-density stuff which is optimal for ski flotation as well as face shots.

Enjoy the below (click to enlarge).

Looking Back

In Secrets of the Greatest Snow on Earth, I discuss the origens of the phrase Greatest Snow on Earth and was able to trace it back to an article written by Tom Korologos in December 1960.  More recently, I stumbled across an early advertisement using the phrase that appeared in the October 1967 issue of Skiing that I thought you might enjoy.  

In the foreground (bottom) is Catherine's Pass, Albion Basin, and the Sugarloaf area of Alta.  If the area looks remarkably underdeveloped, you're right.  The Sugarloaf lift was installed at Alta in 1967.  In all likelihood the photo was taken in 1966 (or earlier) before the lift was installed.  Sunnyside was installed in 1970.  The Albion chair was installed in 1963, but is blocked by the lower portion of Mt. Wolverine.

Just to add further to the nostalgia, here's the cover of that issue of Skiing.

Forty Years of Progress in the Atmospheric Sciences

Source: National Geographic, April 1972

Recently, one of my former graduate students came up on a 1972 National Geographic Article by Walter Orr Roberts, then President of the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) in Boulder, CO.  UCAR is a consortium of universities (including the University of Utah) focused on research and training in the atmospheric sciences, and manages the National Center for Atmospheric Research.

I always enjoy articles like these not only because they show the tremendous accomplishments of my profession, but also some of the areas where we were overly optimistic.  Some highlights from the article:

• At the time, there was considerable optimism concerning likely improvements in weather forecasting, and I think it is safe to say that has come to fruition, although we still have work to do.   

• Satellite imagery was still in it's embryonic stages in 1972, with considerable excitement about future prospects, "Some of the new devices will even measure water vapor at different heights, and others may report on the total levels of such pollutants as dust, carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and sulfur dioxide."  This has come to pass and satellites are now doing all sorts of things including tracking changes in the mass of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets [FYI that NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO-2) is scheduled for launch tomorrow].  

• Efforts were underway to advance understanding of global weather processes, but it was noted that future progress hinged on: (1) the development of "electronic computers that efficientialy perform hundreds of millions of mathematical operations per second", (2) the development of mathematical models of the processes that generate our weather, and (3) the development of a truly global network of weather stations.  We have made considerable progress in all three of these areas, if you include satellite data as a subset of (3). 

• For global observations, it was argued that Ghost balloons (global horizontal sounding techniques) might be useful for proving more observations around the globe, but this has never come to pass, although the idea in some way shape or form is occasionally "floated" again from time to time.  

• At the time, there was considerable optimism regarding cloud seeding.  Although such seeding is still done in parts of the western U.S. today, its effectiveness remains unclear.

• One area where the article was clearly off the mark was in the area of future climate change, where it suggested that cooling might be in our future.  Roberts emphasized the findings from a recent paper by Rasool and Schneider (1971) that overestimated the cooling influence of pollution and was quickly shown to suffer from flaws in equations and data.     

If you are interested in a blast from the past, you can have a look for yourself by clicking here. 

The D-Day Weather Forecast

Assault troops approach Omaha Beach, D-Day, June 6, 1944.
Source: National Archives and Records Administration.

Know the enemy, know yourself; your victory will never be endangered. Know the ground, know the weather; your victory will then be total. - Sun Tzu, The Art of War, c.400-320 b.c.

Today marks the 70th Anniversary of D-Day.  Perhaps the most important weather forecasts ever issued were for the invasion, which required a full moon, clear skies, light winds, and low tides.  The window of opportunity was small and there were no second chances.  Think about the technology at the time.  Numerical weather prediction wasn't yet invented.  There was no Internet (gasp!).  No satellite imagery.  No weather radar.  Few upper-air observations.  No computers to plot data.  Three groups on the Allied side provided forecasts, with Norwegian Sverre Petterssen playing a vital role in the successful forecast.  Nevertheless, as is often the case with history, there is disagreement amongst the participants concerning the actual events and contributions.

James Flemming, a professor of science, technology, and society at Colby College provides a brief summary in his paper, Sverre Petterssen, the Bergen School, and the Forecasts for D-Day.  It's a quick read for history and weather buffs.

Another option is Sverre Petterssen's book, Weathering the Storm: Sverre Petterssen, the D-Day Forecast, and the Rise of Modern Meteorology.

Finally, thanks to a post at the Capital Weather Gang, I just learned about another perspective from John Ross, The Forecast for D-day: And the Weatherman behind Ike's Greatest Gamble.

Personally, I'm partial to Petterssen's account, but only because he was a skier :-).