Russ Steele
Update: The Weather Channel has some great pictures of the Sierra snow!
With some record snow fall on the books, another big storm is rolling in that may push more historical records over the top. The sequence of storms that started on the 18th of March has all ready dropped 5-to-8 feet of snow from Mammoth Mountain to Lake Tahoe. Forecasters are predicting another 60 inches today.
Squaw Valley USA topped the 500-inch mark for season snowfall last week. "We'll hit 600 inches today or tonight," said spokesperson Amelia Richmond. "It's among the really top years. We've only hit 600 inches two other times since 1970."
Kirkwood Mountain Resort, which usually averages 500 inches of snowfall each season, posted 627-to-641 inches as of this morning.
Sierra-at-Tahoe, which surpassed its seasonal average of 480 inches in late February, posted 625 inches as of this morning.
More than 5 feet of snow fell on Heavenly Mountain Resort in four days during this most recent storm, bumping the resort to over 400 inches for the season and putting it in the record books as its third-best season.
Northstar-at-Tahoe has seen the most snow in 25 years, sailing beyond the 500-inch mark.
Boreal Mountain Resort amassed 7.5 feet of snow in the weekend storm, shooting the resort into a record season with 679 inches of total snowfall.
Alpine Meadows recorded the latest snowstorm as its fourth-largest three-day storm, with 101 inches accrued at the summit.
Do you remember all those scary stories about how global warming was going to destroy the Sierra Ski industry, during the Prop 23 campaign and how the ski resorts listed above have been supporting implementation of AB32. I wonder if they are still worrying about all those global warming CO2 emissions. It is also worth noting the old records were in the 1970s when California was under the influence of a cool phase PDO with La Niñas in 1970, 1973, 1975. The current cool phase and a strong La Niña are major contributors to our current snow pack, which is 165% above average.
H/T to Ice Age Now for compiling the numbers.
