California snow cover hits near-record levels for this time of year

The latest study of Sierra Nevada snow levels from California shows the state continues to make progress in combating a severe drought that looked set to last for the fourth year in a row back in December.

The State Department of Water Resources (DWR) conducted its third snow survey of the season at Phillips Station in El Dorado County in the Central Sierra on Friday.

The study measured 116.5 inches of snow with a snow water equivalent of 41.5 inches, according to DWR, which is 177 percent of the March 3 average.

In addition, data collected by 130 snow gauges across the state shows that snow cover across the state is currently 190 percent of average, with a snow-water equivalent thickness of 44.7 inches.

“There were good signs that this would be the fourth year of the drought,” state climate scientist Michael Anderson said at a media briefing on Friday. “Then something interesting happened after Christmas — we started (seeing) a pretty amazing set of atmospheric river families.”

In the three weeks following Dec. 25, nine powerful storms hit the state, hitting particularly hard from the Bay Area to San Diego and the Central and Southern Sierra Nevada.

A drought then set in in the west until the state again experienced “huge amounts of rainfall” about a week ago as a result of a series of unusually cold storms emanating from the Gulf of Alaska, Anderson said.

As a result, in addition to snow cover that is second only to the record set in 1982-1983, the state’s reservoir levels are about 95 percent normal for that time of year.

“Most of them are doing pretty damn well,” said DWR Interstate Resources Manager Janine Jones.

In fact, conditions have improved so much that only about half of the state is still rated severely or moderately dry by the US Drought Monitoring Service, a big change since late January.

Improved hydrological conditions prompted state water managers in February to set supply forecasts at 35 percent of requested water supply for 29 state water agencies assisted by the State Water Project, which serves 27 million people and 750,000 acres of farmland.

This is more than just 5 percent of the requested supplies for 2022.

In addition, the federal Central Valley Project has set supplies for most urban and industrial water users at 75 percent of historical consumption, up from 25 percent last year.

“Obviously, this is a snowy year, so to speak,” Jones said.

However, she warned that while many reservoirs are doing well, Shasta and Trinity in the Northern Sierra are still below average, and the Colorado River Basin, which helps supply Southern California with most of its water, is drier than average, as and many of the state’s reservoirs. important underground aquifers, especially in the Central Valley.

“Where we don’t get that kind of recovery right away is in groundwater,” Jones said. “It just takes a long time for it to recover and for this data (on water table) to come in.”