Snowpack Levels A Concern Across The West

The snowpack has become an issue for not just the Northwest, but much of the west.

USDA meteorologist Brad Rippey says the systems that brought rain, and little snow, to the PNW, resulted in snowy conditions in California.  That he noted gave those mountains a good snowpack to start the winter.  But unfortunately, much of that encouragement has disappeared.

“Now that it has turned dry, we are starting to see those daily averages slipping a bit," Rippey said.  "We were effectively at normal in early January. But now here in mid-January, that is only about 80% of average for the date and only a little less than 40% of average for what we would expect to see pile up by April 1st.”

That concern comes at a time when the Golden State is free from dryness and abnormal drought for the first time in a quarter of a century.

Typical Peak Of Snowpack Falls Between Late February and Early March

And Rippey added the west is starting to run out of time in which that snowpack can be built.

“And so areas like Oregon, much of that state, as well as the northern tiers of California and Nevada, and stretching into the Four Corners region, including much of Arizona and New Mexico and extending into parts of Colorado and Utah, snowpack less than 50% of average for this time of year, nothing insight over the next couple of weeks," Rippey said.  "And so, we're going to get past that halfway point, and we're starting to run out of time to make up some of those deficits.  So, water supply concerns, certainly a problem in those drier areas of the West.”

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