Wasatch Weather Weenies

Given the meager snowpack that generally exists in northern Utah, it's no surprise that the Great Salt Lake is expected to drop to historically low levels this summer.   Last year the lake dropped to its lowest measured elevation at Saltair, 4190.4 feet.  A look at the observations collected at Saltair by the UGSS since last year shows that the lake reached its maximum elevation in early May and dropped about 2.5 feet through fall.   Source:  https://waterdata.usgs.gov/ut/nwis/uv/?site_no=10010000&PARAmeter_cd=62614 The recovery during the winter and spring has thus far been pathetic.  We currently sit at about 4191 feet, nearly 2 feet below where we were last year.  The runoff situation isn't great again this spring.  About the only silver lining is that recent storms have helped the snowpack in the Bear River Basin, which is now running ahead of last year by a bit.   However, that's not going to help a lot and I suspect we'll ...

I hope you enjoyed the Gift from the Gods last weekend.  What a long strange trip this season has been.  It was the best of times.  It was the worst of times.  Weather whiplash for sure. I'll summarize with the Snowbird SNOTEL measured snow water equivalent (SWE) of the snowpack.  At this elevation, the season got off to a good start with SWE increase of 4.7" from October 8 to October 27.   Then the spigot turned off and we only added 1.3" from October 27 to December 9.  The snow faceted on the north half of the compass, forming a persistent weak layer that would haunt us for a significant part of the winter and in many areas melted out on the south side.   The storm track returned in December and Mother Nature added 15.7" of SWE to the snowpack through January 7.  That was a pretty good run and the only period outside of October that the snow accumulation rate that exceeded climatological expectations [i.e., the slope of the media...

The next three days are going to be exciting and interesting for weather and snow lovers as a major spring storm moves through the region.   Today a surface cold front slowly sags into and intensifies over the Great Basin.  The GFS forecast valid 0000 UTC (6 PM MDT) this afternoon shows the front extending across central Nevada and northern Utah very near the Salt Lake City.  For much of the day, we will see strong southwesterly pre-frontal flow, possibly with dust (I assume you haven't had enough of that).   The northern Wasatch Front will probably see a shift to westerly or northwesterly flow late in the day, but it's unclear if that will happen in the Salt Lake Valley.  Right now I'd say the odds favor that not happening, but I can't rule it out, especially for the northern part of the valley.  It will, however, be a dry front this afternoon, so the main impact will be on winds and temperatures.   The models differ on the exact moveme...

It's been a while since I did a post, but I've been busy working on the 2nd Edition of Secrets of the Greatest Snow on Earth.  It's coming along nicely and I'm hoping to get it to my publisher by the end of May.   I have good news and bad news on the forecast front.  The bad news is we just had a frontal passage in the Salt Lake Valley and it has come loaded with dust.   Watch the Wasatch Range slowly disappear as post-frontal dust moves into the Salt Lake Valley this morning. Not good for lungs or snowpack. pic.twitter.com/L7jBCpSzSy — Jim Steenburgh (@ProfessorPowder) April 19, 2022 The moisture lags the surface front by a good ways and is pretty scant at that.  We'll see a few valley showers and mountain snow showers later this afternoon or evening, but the latter won't add up to much.  The good news, however, is that the system coming in late Thursday night/early Friday morning and affecting us through Saturday looks more potent.  Below i...

It's been a pretty good April storm cycle so far.  Totals at Alta Collins per automated measurements: 4 PM Monday 11 April - 4 AM Tuesday 12 April: 11 inches 4 AM Tuesday 12 April - 4 PM Tuesday 12 April: 2 inches 4 PM Tuesday 12 April - 4 AM Wednesday 13 April: 6 inches I suspect the skiing was pretty good yesterday and will be excellent this morning where untracked.  The northern Wasatch also got hit pretty well.  Snowbasin is reporting 15 inches in the last 48 hours and has announced they will reopen for skiing Friday through Sunday.  It's never over until it's over.   I'd like to summarize the forecast through Friday afternoon as "dribs and drabs" but that seems unfairly discouraging for April, so I'll say "bits and pieces" instead.  Currently radar shows snowshowers moving into the northern Wasatch from the west.   This general pattern will continue this morning, with the northern Wasatch likely to receive the most snowfall and the centr...

 The storm delivered as forecast (I love to say that!) in most areas including 11 inches through 8 AM at Alta-Collins.   Here at the University of Utah, the ground was sprinkled this morning with some beautiful graupel particles.  Below is an example of a pea sized, conical-shaped graupel particle outside the Student Life Center.  Graupel forms as tiny supercooled cloud droplets collide and freeze on an ice particle.  Typically it has a higher fall speed than snowflakes (3 meters per second compared to 0.5 to 1 meter per seconds) and requires a fairly strong updraft to form.  Radar imagery overnight suggests that the convective cell moving over the University of Utah at 12:40 UTC (6:40 AM, see below) may have produced it, although there were one or two other cells that moved through the area earlier.   We are now solidly into the unstable, postfrontal flow, although as shown in the time-height section below, the flow direction below and at cr...

It's hard not to look at the satellite loop below and not get excited.  There's a deep cyclone making landfall on the Pacific Northwest coast with the concomitant cold front pushing across eastern Oregon.   Source: College of DuPage As I type this, it's pretty easy to find the front.  It just blasted through Rome in southeastern Oregon, resulting in a wind shift from southwesterly to northwesterly and a 10˚F drop in temperature in an hour.  Source: MesoWest The pattern being forecast by the HRRR model for today is, however, not straightforward, due to the effects of terrain on the storm system.  The forecast for 1800 UTC (1200 MDT) is pretty consistent with the observation and shows a cold front (blue line) extending across northwest Nevada into southwest Idaho, with Rome being in the post-frontal environment.   However, as the cold front moves eastward across northern Nevada, a sharp windshift known as the Great Basin Convergence Zone develops ah...

Lenny Kravitz doesn't ski.  I know because he played the closing day concert at Ischgl Ski Resort in Austria in 2019 and said so.  Perhaps he's learned by now.  If not, he could think about taking advantage of the return of winter to Utah. We start with the situation yesterday when spring was full on.  Knowing we were going to see cooler temperatures and stubbornly firm snow this weekend, I spent a few hours running laps at Alta.  Conditions were about as good as they get for spring skiing with firm but very carve-able groomers at the opening bell and very few people on the hill through the morning, enabling one to ski at maximum warp.  By about 1 PM, things were getting softer and crowds were picking, but by then my foot and ankle had enough.  I suspect the skiing was fun in the afternoon, especially on steeper off piste that for the most part was relatively bump free. This weekend we are trending cooler.  It will take a while longer to soften up...

There's a storm coming in tonight but the big story for the mountains isn't snow, but wind. As shown by the GFS jet-stream level forecast for 1800 UTC (1200 MDT) tomorrow, the Pacific jet will be penetrating across a low-amplitude off the Pacific coast and southeastward into Utah.  Jet stream level wind speeds at that time exceed 60 meters per second (120 knots).   I used to fly a decent amount between Salt Lake City and Denver, and in patterns like this I used to plan on there being no drink service and the fasten seatbelt sign being on the entire flight.  It's a recipe for mountain-induced gravity waves and turbulence.   The time-height section for Salt Lake City shows a lot of black flags at upper levels from 0000 UTC Tuesday (6 PM MDT Monday) to 1200 UTC Thursday (6 AM MDT Thursday).  Winds at 650 mb, roughly the altitude of Mt. Baldy and other 11,000 foot peaks, maximize from around 0600 to 1200 UTC Tuesday (Midnight to 6 AM MDT Tuesday) as a cold...

I haven't been touring due to a foot injury and haven't been in Big Cottonwood Canyon for a couple of months.  We went to Brighton and Solitude today for a few hours of laps today, however, as my son is saving his last Alta/Snowbird Ikon day for what he hopes will be a powder day.   The day of peak daily median snowpack at the Brighton SNOTEL is April 16.  At the Mill D North SNOTEL it is April 1st.  So to see the snowpack so devastated was quite remarkable.  South aspects are bare, even to the summit of Reynolds Peak.  And elsewhere the snowpack is remarkably thin for this time of year.  Below is an extreme example on the Solbright trail from Solitude to Brighton, which is on a south aspect.  The end is nigh for the Big Cottonwood "Interconnect."   Most of January and February were very dry and there was no March miracle.  In fact, March provided a good example of how intensifying warm waves are altering the snow hydrology of ...

A new ski resort is being planned for the central Wasatch and scheduled to open in 2023/24.  It will be unlike any other ski area in Utah. Taking a page from club skifields in New Zealand, the resort will consist of two surface tows that will extend up an area of private land that exists in upper Cardiff Fork, beginning at about 9000 feet elevation and going to approximately 10,000 feet to a ski run known today as Power Outage on the north side of the ridgeline between Cardiff Peak and Mount Superior.   Accessing the lifts will require skinning or hiking, which is the case at some club fields in New Zealand.  For example, accessing the Temple Basin skifield in Arthur's Pass requires a 45 minute walk to get to 3 rope tows.  To access Cardiff Resorts, one will either need to do the long schlep up Cardiff Fork or access from Alta via Cardiff Bowl and Pass.  There is some talk of providing snowmobile tows up Cardiff Fork for an additional charge.   T...