Posted by Bill McBride on 4/03/2016 08:22:00 PM 149 Comments
The El Niño
Bust in California
by Bill McBride on 4/03/2016 11:10:00 AM
From Accuweather: El Nino-induced snow proves to be
'disappointing' for drought-stricken California
Much-needed mountain snow and rain returned to California
this winter, but fell short of expectations amid a super El Niño.
The official snow season for California's Sierra Nevada came
to an end at the start of April on a below-normal note and one that AccuWeather
Senior Meteorologist Ken Clark called "disappointing."
The amount of water stored in the snow for the entire
mountain chain averaged 14 percent below normal on April 1, according to the
California Cooperative Snow Surveys.
The northern Sierra fared better than the southern Sierra
with the amount of water in the snow averaging only 5 percent below normal,
compared to the 27 percent below normal in the south.
"The numbers are not anywhere near what many had wanted
going into the winter," Clark said. "The much-heralded El Niño
brought more snow than the previous four years, but that was not hard to
accomplish."
Here are some excellent graphs showing snow water content in
the Sierra. This was close to an average year in the Northern Sierra, but below
average in Central and South. There was more rain and snow than the previous
four years, but this will still be considered year 5 of the drought.
Tyndall CreekNote: For Pacific Crest Trail and John Muir
Trail hikers, I recommend using the Upper Tyndall Creek sensor to track the
snow conditions. This is the fifth dry year in a row along the JMT, but there
should be more water along the trail this summer than the previous four years,
and still not too much snow on the passes.
This graph shows the snow water content for Upper Tyndall
Creek for the last 9 years. There is more snow than the previous four years,
but that isn't saying much.
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