Western US snowfall

[lowangle al]

Now with big resorts owning resorts across the country they have been bringing employes from closed east coast resorts to the west.

[Manney]

I guess that works for full time staff. Hard getting pt employees when classes running in hs, college. Weekends, mostly for those ppl. Maybe a few local ski bums.

PT is the brass ring for the recreation industry. Employee benefits ~0. Makes a difference on bottom line. Esp when labor make up a big % of operating costs. Lots of s hemisphere workers on the hills during ski season in the n hemisphere. School’s out, pt student labor doesn’t get, expect much. Meals and a place to crash + hill benefits in exchange for minimum wages. Like the agriculture sector and Mexican labor.

Crazy snow though. WC has been in drought for years. Then… Epic snow. Hill managers and CEOs of big outfits must be scrambling to keep operations going. Lots of dividends this year if the can make that happen.

[bauerb]

my son worked at a fancy hotel at Big Sky over the winter holidays between semesters in college. he had an amazing time and even managed to save a few bucks. I don't however see the job he had as amazing opportunity for a foreign worker to earn/save big bucks. at my local resort, I'm pretty sure the employees are local to Montana. there is some employee housing but its a very small mom/pop resort. I suspect that it comes down to how many daily lift tickets are being sold...since season passes are already accounted for, you might as well close and pocket the margin if you are not selling walk-up lift tickets in April.

[Manney]

It’s a package deal. Visit USA, ski big mountains, be away from home, gain different cultural experience. Wages aren’t everything. Like a lifeguard invited to work in Vanuatu between semesters. Picking fruit or veg, not as exciting. Different workforce though. Skiing is a skill. General farm labor isn’t.

[Montana St Alum]

I don't however see the job he had as amazing opportunity for a foreign worker to earn/save big bucks.

My acquaintance from Ghana was sending money home to his wife and kids and felt it was good pay, but he was working at a coffee shop up at Deer Valley. Most of the resort workers looked young, fun and unattached, though!

[bauerb]

hourly wage is $15 or so, employee housing is $15/day. and you have to buy your own food...you get discounts at the restaurants but 50% off tourists prices is still outrageous. local grocery stores are also tourist prices. if you have a job where you can earn big tips AND you get a full workweek of shifts, you stand a chance of saving money. might be a little easier in resorts closer to cheap food, but Big Sky is remote

[Tom M]

It has been a record breaking snow year in our area. It's not the mega snowfall they have had in the Sierras, but record-breaking nonetheless. Afton posted 177 inches as of April 1, and I don't really think of Afton as a snowy location in our valley. We generally get more snow in my area, but we don't have an official snow recording location. Just for fun, here is a photo of a home in my subdivision taken this morning (4/8/2023). It is a two story home with a metal roof. It will be some time before they can see out the 1st floor windows.

[bauerb]

https://unofficialnetworks.com/2023/04/ ... reopening/

[jyw5]

I now feel bad about telling @@jyw5 not to come to lassen this year in June. Turns out this would have been the year...

I think the most interesting thing is not only the quantity of snow inches, but the water equivalent too. Last year we got close to 100% of median snowfall in many places:


However, no where near median water. Here's the snow water equivalent chart with the median, this year, and last year plotted for the snow lab near tahoe:
css lab-ca-wteq-por(1).png

So the takeaway of this special la niña year is that not only were there lots of storms with high ratio snow... but there was also a ton of water in those storms which is not normally the case at all.

No worries!

I just got back from Switzerland. Going to AK next wk to meet up with friends and fly out and do some multiday touring.

Any of those mountains out west would have been great this yr. Just didn't quite fit into my schedule anyway. There's always snow somewhere. I booked a 11 day ski trip to Greenland for next yr, and I might be moving to Calgary next season, so I don't really feel the fomo from not skiing out west this yr.

[DG99]

Our local Oregon snowpack has been deep, but precipitation generally less than the normal average. It’s just been colder than normal I guess. We had an unprecedented deep powder day April 2. Wow!

Nothing like the California craziness.

We went down to Tahoe a while back, spring break. Deep snowpack and lovely late season powder days.
Looked like the shoveling was tough work when the big snowfalls happened.