Jobs Peak rises over Carson Valley after the last storm.
Photo by Kurt Hildebrand.
The storm door reopens this week with a strong winter storm possible on Thursday and Friday.
A winter storm watch has been issued for 2 a.m. Thursday to 4 a.m. Friday with forecasters predicting 1-5 inches of snow down to Western Nevada’s valley floors. Accumulations for the foothills above 5,500 feet could be 6-12 inches.
A winter storm warning for the Tahoe Basin takes effect 10 p.m. tonight through 10 p.m. Friday, with 10-18 inches of snow forecast for lake level, with the brunt of the storm on Thursday.
Last week’s atmospheric river brought plenty of precipitation to Western Nevada, according to snow telemetry and the National Weather Service.
But one of the challenges so far in this water year has been having cold enough temperatures to ensure the precipitation falls as snow, according to Natural Resource Conservation Service Hydrologist Jeff Anderson.
“At least we’re back in the storm track,” he said on Monday. “There should be some more precipitation, but we need the temperature to align with when the precipitation arrives to see snow.”
Anderson and representatives of the Federal Water Master’s Office checked on the snow pack at Mount Rose on Monday, where he said it was running 85 percent.
That’s a lot better than Carson Pass’s 75 percent on Monday morning.
Anderson said it appeared that Ebbett’s Pass at the top of the East Fork of the Carson River received rain.
“A lot of our sites had a lot of rain,” he said. “Ebbett’s was surprising. The rain really lifted high along the crest. There was 6.9 inches of precipitation, but the snow pillow only had 4.6 inches there. Because the snow pack wasn’t that deep, the sponge only absorbed so much water.”
That meant more than 2 inches of snow water equivalent that should have stayed there ended up flowing down the river.
Lower elevations haven’t collected much in the way of snow, with Spratt Creek at 6,060 feet showing a goose egg for snow water equivalent on Monday.
“All of these sites should have snow in the middle of February,” he said. “There are some years, where they don’t, but they have snow most of the time.”
And the warmer storms make it more difficult for what snow pack does exist to absorb additional precipitation.
The rain forms preferential channels through the snow pack that allows the water to flow right through, Anderson said.
That reduces the capacity of the snow to absorb moisture.
