Capital press., February 05, 2016, Page 3, Image 3

February 5, 2016
3
CapitalPress.com
Snowpack
Snowpack above normal, at least for now
Experts hopeful,
but say later
reports will tell tale
California snow
water equivalents
Percent of the historic average snow water
equivalent for Feb. 1, measured in inches.
Capital Press staff report
Oregon
Washington
MOUNT VERNON, Wash.
— An abundance of rain could
shorten the duration of low-
er elevation Cascade Moun-
tain snowpack, Washington’s
snowpack expert warns.
There’s been a lot of rain
on top of snow up to the 4,500-
foot level and that’s a concern
because it takes less energy to
melt snow that’s saturated with
water, said Scott Pattee, water
supply specialist of the Wash-
ington Snow Survey Offi ce of
the USDA Natural Resourc-
es Conservation Service in
Mount Vernon.
Water-saturated
snow
heightens the potential for ear-
lier and faster melting than de-
sired, Pattee said.
When low-level snowpack
melts too early irrigators are
forced to turn to reservoir
water earlier than they want
which is what happened in last
year’s drought.
“Right now things look
pretty good, but we need tem-
peratures to keep from going
too high and damaging our
snowpack,” Pattee said.
Rain and melting cycles,
typical of El Nino weather
patterns, have “hampered” the
snowpack below 5,000 feet, he
said.
The statewide snowpack
was 109 percent of normal on
Feb. 1, down from 120 percent
a month ago but much better
than 38 percent on Feb. 1 a
year ago and 55 percent two
years ago.
Five water reservoirs serv-
ing the Yakima Basin are 117
percent of average for this time
of year.
February and March weath-
er will be key in whether the
snowpack remains good
enough to stave off any local-
ized irrigation water shortages.
“For the most part we are
past the cold part of winter.
The outlook for more snow is
Redding
Central Sierra:
116% of normal
5
Sacramento
80
N
Southern
Sierra:
107% of
normal
San
Francisco
Fresno
50 miles
5
Statewide
average: 116%
Dan Wheat/Capital Press
Bomber Cliffs, named for a B-24 bomber that crashed into them in 1944, tower above Bomber Run at Mission Ridge
Ski Area south of Wenatchee, Wash. The ski area operates between 4,570 and 6,820 feet in elevation and has more
snow than last year.
Western U.S. snow water equivalent
Basin-wide percent of 2016 snowpack compared to
the aggregate average (1971-2010).
108
106
134
96
118
101 100
104
50
99
98
105
91
119
97 88
91 81
95
89
65
78
95 90 104
92
116
110 96 90
122 118
95
123
132
139
113 115 96 90
52
87
150
124
103
102
141
94
66
154 153
96
63
123 101
96
102
153 156
79
75
149
161 151 141156 100
92
152
63 106
156
101 103
149
98 106
107
104
153
114
101 117 102
147
99
133
126
108 95
135
106 101
119
152
108
109
114
115150 155 165
118
162
140
118
123
113
120
143
Percentage key
(As of Feb. 1)
Unavailable
Less than 50%
50-69%
70-89%
90-109%
110-129%
130-149%
More than 149%
82
149
152
116 133113
116
136
100
118
93
92
111
Miles
0
Source: USDA, Natural Resources Conservation Service
a little vague. We want to keep
the snowline down to 3,000 feet
for another month to month-
and-a-half. Then we should be
able to breathe easy,” said Pat-
tee.
Snowpack below 3,500 feet
is early irrigation water and was
nonexistent last season, he said,
adding he’s not worried about
higher elevation snowpack.
The fi ve reservoirs serving
the Yakima Basin — Keech-
elus, Kachess, Cle Elum,
Bumping and Rimrock — total
57 percent of capacity on Feb.
1 at a combined 610,942 acre
feet. Total capacity is 1,065,400
acre feet.
Precipitation was 83 percent
of average in the Yakima Basin
in January, said Chris Lynch,
hydrologist for the U.S. Bureau
of Reclamation’s Yakima Proj-
ect in Yakima.
Streamfl ows for April
through September should be
near to slightly above normal,
Pattee said.
As of Feb. 1, the Spokane
basin snowpack remained the
lowest in the state at 91 percent
of normal. The upper Columbia
(Okanogan and Methow rivers)
was 134 percent. The central
Columbia (Chelan, Entiat and
Wenatchee) was 118, the up-
per Yakima was 100 and the
lower Yakima, 122. The Walla
Walla was 122, lower Snake 99
and the lower Columbia was
104. South Puget Sound (from
Cascade crest to lowlands) was
101, central Puget Sound was
96, north Puget Sound 108 and
the Olympics, 106.
116
157
150
300
Capital Press graphic
throughout Idaho.
A high-pressure ridge forced
storms around Idaho from late
December through Jan. 13,
when weather patterns in the
state became more active, said
Ron Abramovich, Idaho water
supply specialist with USDA’s
Natural Resources Conserva-
tion Service.
“In mid-January, the storms
started coming back in,”
Abramovich said. “We actually
ended up receiving 80 to 120
percent of average snowfall
across the whole state, which
isn’t too bad given the way (the
month) started.”
Southern Idaho continues
to have the state’s best snow-
packs. Oakley, located south of
Burley, had an especially wet
January, receiving 126 percent
of normal precipitation for the
month, and bringing the snow-
pack to 141 percent of normal
for the season.
The Owyhee, Bruneau and
Salmon Falls basins continue
to have snowpacks of about
153 percent of normal, and
snowpacks in the low-elevation
mountains of southeast Idaho,
including the Willow, Black-
foot and Portneuf ranges, re-
main at 114 percent of normal.
The Morris Creek snow sur-
vey site within the Boise Ba-
sin has 123 percent of average
snowpack, its thickest snow-
pack since 2006, Abramovich
said.
In Central Idaho, the Big
Wood basin maintained 122
percent of normal snowpack,
but the Little Wood and Big
Lost basins dropped to about
normal following below-aver-
age January snowfall.
Abramovich has been fi eld-
ing calls from residents of the
Sun Valley area concerned
about snow loads on their roofs,
seeking the conversion to cal-
culate pounds per square foot
of snow to determine if they
should shovel them.
January snowfall ranged
from 85 to 95 percent of normal
in Northern Idaho, bringing
seasonal totals down to 97 per-
cent of normal in the Panhandle
and 95 percent in the Clearwa-
ter area.
In response to damage
caused by severe storms in the
region from Dec. 16-27, Pres-
ident Barrack Obama signed
disaster declarations Feb. 1 for
Benewah, Bonner and Koote-
nai counties. Benewah County
Clerk Deanna Bramblett ex-
plained heavy snow, combined
with wet soil, caused trees to
tip and power lines to fall, and
commissioners requested the
declarations in large part to help
the utilities.
The Upper Snake region,
which has had the best snow-
packs in the state during the pri-
or two years, is closer to normal
this season, with 95 percent of
average snowpack above Pal-
isades Reservoir and 103 per-
cent of normal in the Henry’s
Fork and Teton River basin.
Brian Olmstead, general
manager with Twin Falls Ca-
nal Co., said the entire Upper
Snake system above American
Falls Reservoir increased from
89 percent of normal to its aver-
age snowpack during the fi nal
two weeks of January.
“With any kind of normal
scenarios from here on out, we
should have an adequate sup-
ply,” Olmstead said.
The Upper Snake reservoir
system has more than 630,000
acre feet less water than at this
time last year, said John Hil-
dreth, civil engineer with the
Bureau of Reclamation.
“Where the snowpack is at
right now, I’d say we probably
wouldn’t have enough water to
fi ll the system,” Hildreth said,
estimating the chances that the
system will fi ll at 50-50.
National Weather Service
meteorologist Alex Desmet
said current predictions call for
mostly dry weather throughout
Alan Kenaga/Capital Press
California
SACRAMENTO — The
season’s second manual snow
survey in the Sierra Nevada on
Feb. 2 found a snowpack water
content of 130 percent of nor-
mal for this time of year, state
offi cials said.
Frank Gehrke, the Califor-
nia Department of Water Re-
sources’ snow surveys chief,
and his team found a snow wa-
ter equivalent of 25.4 inches —
well above the average of 19.5
inches for the February survey
— on a snow course 90 miles
east of Sacramento.
The results were a marked
contrast to February 2015,
when Gehrke found just 2.5
inches of snow water content
at the same testing station.
Both the depth and water con-
tent this year were the highest
since 2005, when a depth of
77.1 inches and a water content
of 29.9 inches were recorded,
state offi cials said.
However, while precipita-
tion levels have improved this
year, that doesn’t mean the
drought is over, Gehrke and
other offi cials caution.
“Keep in mind these are
snapshots in time and limited
sampling,” Gehrke told report-
40
Los Angeles
Source: California Dept.
of Water Resources
Idaho into mid-February. The
long-term outlook slightly fa-
vors wetter weather in South-
ern Idaho and drier weather in
Northern Idaho, he said.
15
Bakersfield
10
8
ers, adding it’s “probably more
useful” to look at electronic
readings that show California’s
snowpack was at 114 percent
of normal levels as of Feb. 2
statewide.
“That’s certainly an encour-
aging start” to the winter, he
said. “Clearly we want to see
this keep coming.”
Each year, the DWR con-
ducts fi ve manual snow sur-
veys with media present at the
Phillips Station plot, whose ele-
vation is 6,800 feet. Additional
surveys will be held around the
beginning of March, April and
May.
The survey comes as the
State Water Resources Control
Board announced that Califor-
nians have reduced their water
use by 25.5 percent since June,
continuing to meet Gov. Jer-
ry Brown’s mandate despite
a decline in the statewide wa-
ter-savings rate during the last
three months of 2015.
In December the statewide
conservation rate was 18.3 per-
cent, down from 20.4 percent
in November, compared to the
same months in 2013, the water
board stated. Offi cials noted the
winter months offer fewer op-
portunities to conserve water,
as its consumption is already at
its lowest.
Reporters Eric Mortenson,
Dan Wheat, John O’Connell
and Tim Hearden contributed
to this report.
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Idaho
BOISE — After a dry start
to January, a stormy second half
of the month helped to maintain
strong mountain snowpacks
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PORTLAND — Oregon’s
snowpack looks good as Feb-
ruary unfolds, but the hydrol-
ogist who tracks it says any-
thing can happen in the next
couple months.
Thanks to heavy rain, snow
and chilly weather through Jan-
uary — normal Oregon winter
weather, in other words — the
snowpack draped upon the
state’s mountains is well above
average for this time year.
Even the dry southeast cor-
ner is 140 percent of normal,
said Julie Koeberle, a hydrol-
ogist with the USDA’s Nat-
ural Resources Conservation
Service in Portland. The only
region lagging is Mount Hood
and the Willamette River ba-
sin, but even it is near or at
normal levels for this time of
year, Koeberle said.
February is typically a
heavy snowfall month, and
March and April storms can
add more stored water, so at
fi rst glance the state is in good
shape, Koeberle said.
Trouble is, there are no
guarantees.
“There’s a lot left than cat
happen,” she said. Snow could
continue to accumulate, but an
unusually warm February or
a heavy rain that melts snow
could fl ip the situation. “We
could lose some of our snow-
pack,” Koeberle said.
Long-range forecasts in-
dicate somewhat warmer
weather over the next couple
months, but they lack detail
and a good snowstorm could
pop up as well, she said.
“February is crucial be-
cause so much can happen,”
she said.
Northern Sierra/Trinity:
120% of normal
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