If a butterfly in Japan flaps its wings, the small whisper of wind doesn’t necessarily snowball into a hurricane on its way to ravage the coasts of California.
But when buoys offshore from the Hawaiian Islands drastically rise with Pacific swells, it’s likely a snowstorm is on its way to the Wasatch Back. According to Mike Ruzek — known on Instagram as PowderBuoy — it’s an indicator with about 80% accuracy. That’s why he pays attention to buoy movements in Hawaii to anticipate snowfall in Utah, and why tens of thousands of people pay attention to his predictions.
Ruzek started using indicators roughly 3,000 miles away from Utah in predicting Park City’s weather almost 20 years ago.
“In 2004, one of my clients who is a retired engineer moved from Park City to Hawaii and was surfing there and would track surf buoys,” he said. “Being from Park City, as well, he would check the weather at home and he noticed that after they’d get these great swells in Hawaii about two weeks later, we’d get snow here.”
At first, Ruzek was skeptical.
“He told me about this correlation, and I’m like, ‘Hank, there’s no way … there’s no shot,'” he remembered.
Sure enough, Ruzek started keeping track of both measurements and found his friend’s recognition reliable enough that he felt confident planning ski days based off the buoys in Hawaii.
About five years ago, he looked back over a five-year period to see whether the ocean could be trusted. He found that roughly four out of every five of his tropical predictions became frosty realities on the slopes around Park City.
“Sixty percent of the time, it works every time,” he said, quoting a line from the film “Anchorman” and exhibiting each drop of Brian Fantana’s charismatic confidence.
For a few years, his powder-day indicator was a tool used with his friends. Then sometime in 2008 or 2009, his buddy suggested he post his findings on a Facebook page so the group didn’t have to constantly check in with him for these forecasts.
In a decision that now burdens him with what he described as “self-loathing,” he posted his findings publicly.
Jodi Saeland — a meteorologist who formerly worked for Fox 13 — became interested in his operation.
“She reached out to me. She’s like, ‘All right, I’m a meteorologist and there’s all these parents on the Brighton Ski Team and nobody listens to me and they all follow your buoy. What is up with your buoy?'” he said. “I talked to her, and she ended up writing an article for Ski Utah.”
After that, Pandora’s box was fully opened, and there was nothing Ruzek could do to keep the crowds of snowhounds from pouring out of it and onto the mountain on the days he predicted snowfall.
“I don’t like crowds as much as the next person,” he said, faint regret an undertone in his voice. “But at the same time, it’s a lot of fun and I’ve gotten some really great love and commentary from people that have had amazing days, and so that part is really enjoyable.”
Despite his method’s success, Ruzek still described it as “a real questionable science.” But the reasoning goes like this: When a buoy goes from floating on swells at five feet to 15 — something he calls a “buoy pop” — it’s often caused by a low-pressure system. About two weeks later, he sees those systems move through Utah.
Some have come to trust him more than the meteorologists.
“I think it’s nice. It kind of like brings back this idea of local weatherman that people have,” Park City skier E.J. Elliott said. “In this world of Instagram and social media and everyone not having cable, it’s kind of hard finding that local resource that you feel comfortable with, so I feel like he kind of fills in that void for the Park City and Salt Lake crowd.”
Despite his quasi-celebrity status among Utahns susceptible to the highly contagious powder flu, Ruzek hasn’t hidden his predictions behind paywalls or engaged in other ways to monetize his folk-meteorology beyond selling a few items of merchandise.
He has, however, supported fundraisers for the Utah Avalanche Center. Monday night, he hosted a Powder Buoy Powder Party fundraiser for the organization in conjunction with Park City Brewing. Hundreds of guests paid $100 to enjoy food, have a few drinks and support the center.
Ruzek said the center and its cause are “near and dear” to his heart.
A few weeks before Christmas in 2008, he was one of 150 people in a probe line on Baldy Mountain who found the body of 27-year-old Heather Gross after she’d been buried by an avalanche.
“She was taken down through an area called Fields of Glory,” Ruzek said.
About two months later, just weeks after his daughter’s birth, he found himself “caught in the same fracture, same slide” but was able to get to the side of the oncoming mass of snow.
Now, he helps provide funding that will help keep his followers — who he referred to affectionately as buoy heads — safer.
“Events like this tonight are great ways that our entire community can come together and really celebrate winter coming up, while at the same time supporting the operations of the Utah Avalanche Center,” the center’s executive director, Chad Brackelsberg, said Monday night at the event.