Huge Increase in Northwest Snowpack and Water Resources

A month ago, there were considerable concerns about the Northwest snowpack.  True, mid-December is too early to get worried, since there is a long history of poor December snowpack leading to bountiful snowpack by April 1.  But snowpack was sparse in December and folks were nervous.

 Below is the snowpack summary from the SNOTEL network on December 14, 2010.

Not good.  The Olympics and western slopes of the Cascades were at roughly 33% of normal, as was the eastern slopes of the central WA Cascades.  Only a small portion of the region (mainly SE Oregon) was at normal or above (green and blue colors).


Fast forward to this morning (January 16th).  Wow.  No more red colors (less than 50% of normal) and most of the region is green.  Huge improvement.


The meteorological bounty extended beyond snow.  There has been lots of rain that has helped to fill local reservoirs.   For example, consider Seattle's reservoir system (see below).  Its reservoirs have surged--not only WAY above normal (blue line), but as high as typical as the normal high in June.  Seattle will have plenty of water in the future.

 That confidence is supported by Seattle's watershed snowpack (below), which only a few days ago was almost exactly at normal.


Much more water is coming!  Here is the predicted precipitation through Tuesday at 4 PM, which shows wet conditions from California to British Columbia.

 And much of that will go into snowpack (note substantial amounts in the Cascades and Sierra Nevada.




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