Mind boggling temperatures from the western United States currently. Even watching from a distance here in Austria, they blow me away.
As I write this, it is Friday morning in Austria and some of the numbers for Thursday in the US are not in yet. Thus I'm going to use observations from Wednesday to illustrate the scale and intensity of this event before boring into what data I have access to from Thursday.
Below are the rankings for high temperatures on Wednesday relative to prior March 18ths. Wide spread records for the date across the southwest US but even all the way up into Montana (asterisks indicate a tie for the highest temperature of the date). It appears every western state had at least one station that tied or set a record temperature for the date. Washington was the "coolest" western state, but even there, Chelan tied their record high.
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| Source: https://sercc.oasis.unc.edu/Map.php |
Departures from average were impressively high. Many sites were more than 20°F above average, and this is likely the 1991-2020 average so departure relative to the now old and obsolete 20th century average would be even bigger. Some sites were at or above 25°F above average. I couldn't find a +30, but maybe it's in there somewhere.
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| Source: https://sercc.oasis.unc.edu/Map.php |
Wednesday's highest temperature was 108°F at a location near North Shore, CA, which is not on the Pacific Ocean but instead the Salton Sea. Yesterday (Thursday), Palm Springs hit 107, Thermal 108, and Indio 108. I believe those 108s are all time monthly maximum temperature records for March and possibly all time for the entire US. Adding to the misery a bit further east is 106 in Yuma and 105 in Phoenix.
Records in the Palm Springs Area go back to 1922. In 1938 they hit 100 in March for the first time. In 1966 104. In 1988 103. And now this year 106 (Wednesday) and 107 (Thursday). In Thermal, records go back to 1951. They hit 102 in 1966 and 1988 and now 107.
Meanwhile in Salt Lake City, yesterdays 79 was a record for the date but not the month. The monthly record is still 80, set on 31 March 2012. Don't worry. We'll likely set a new record on Friday and/or Saturday.
Utah ski areas are suffering. Eagle Point and Cherry Peak are closed. Snowbasin's last day is Sunday. That's a major Utah ski resort, ranked #1 in the US by some surveys and rankings, with a substantive snowmaking system, packing it in on March 22nd. I looked at the webcam from the base of Wildcat yesterday and I simply could not believe it. It doesn't even seem possible.
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| https://www.snowbasin.com/the-mountain/web-cams/ |
My heart goes out to the resort, which moved heaven and Earth for us this winter for our field campaign. Despite a slow start to the season, we actually got some great data and will learn a lot, but never in my wildest dreams did I expect to see such a sparse natural snowpack in mid March.
Here are a few SNOTEL observations based on data from Wednesday, the most recent data that I have available as I write this. There is no snow at Ben Lomond Trail. Median for March 18 is 17.6". The snowpack at Ben Lomond Peak (7690 ft) appears to be ripe (i.e., it has warmed through depth to 0ºC) and has declined 3.3 inches from its peak and sits just above it's all time low for the date. Snowbird is not at an all-time low, but it also appears to have declined some from its peak, although that site is a little flaky so I'm not going to fully endorse that as reality (maybe someone can comment). That said, all other SNOTEL sites in the central Wasatch have seen declines in total snowpack water equivalent in the past few days. Not necessarily a lot, but some.
My view of these events is that they are not the new normal, but they are the new extreme, at least for now. We should expect natural climate variability to still give our winters and snowpacks ups and downs in the coming years, including some good or even great snow years (as we just had in 2022/23). But, we are seeing an emerging trend to warmer conditions, meaning more frequent, more intense, and longer duration heat waves, more precipitation falling as rain instead of snow, more mid-winter snowmelt events, etc. These trends, caused by human-caused global warming, will have the biggest impact on snowfall and snowpack in the lower elevations, as we have seen this season, but will also bring change to the upper elevations.
The reality is that you were warned. Some of you took it seriously. Others have called it a hoax and even today are working to dismantle the outstanding US climate-science enterprise, such as breaking up world-class research institutes like the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). Still others are pushing fossil fuels and delaying a transition to a lower-carbon world.
Due to the slow response of the climate system and socio-economic change, we are already committed to more warming in the next 20-30 years (maybe longer). Will the powers that be continue to resist change and pursue a high carbon, fossil fueled future? Good luck with that.
I can't help but wonder how Sundance hasn't called it quits yet
ReplyDeleteYeah, the cams look awfully grim.
DeleteAwfully great time to be a young adult :) Growing up here in SLC while consistently voting blue and pushing for change but seeing us slide further into a dismal future has jaded me. Unfortunately not much more I can do unless I want to put my life on the line and get real personal with some billionaires and politicians.
ReplyDeleteI was warned but also couldn't do anything substantial about it. I'm not so in favor of blaming the general population when the U.S. has been so systemically hostile against any sort of progress and education, and find it just as a way to further the divide of left vs. right. This is top vs. bottom and we need to be empathetic to everyone, even those we may have warned and turned away from. I'm almost certainly not having kids and probably going to have to move to a country with a real watershed, but the least we can do is build forward-thinking and caring communities while we can.
As you have pointed out, the culture war is a distraction from the class war. Hopefully the cultural elites and the blue collar class can stop huffing social media fumes and realize they have strong common interests.
DeleteAt least your kids won’t be climate deniers
DeleteWhat an odd comment. "Alway voting blue." "Nothing I can do unless I put my life on the line." That sounds a little extreme. "I'm not having kids because of how things are right now." What? And then "At least we can build caring communities... etc." Um...but you won't have kids? I think moving out of the USA is a good idea for you.
DeleteAs a young adult- ditto. Older adults (like the one above) can continue to be confused as to why birth rates are declining (if they don't wish to listen), but I completely agree that having kids seems completely reckless given the state of the environment (and politics, and the economy, etc)
DeleteYou may recall telling me climate change is non linear we will get much more rain on snow. If all the rain that fell at 6000 ft had been snow Snowbasin wud stay open. Got cold dry snow yesterday 11am Days Draw trees, the whole elevation aspect angle calc playing out in spades. Porter Fork road now asphalt
ReplyDeleteNo one knows what you’re saying
DeleteWe did get a lot of rain when in the past it would've been snow. Do you remember that warm and dry January? The entire month was dry as a bone. It's been a dismal year for precip - even as rain. Here's hoping for a better water year 26/27
DeleteLong discussion, Snowbird snotel, red precip normal, blue swe below normal
Deletehttps://wcc.sc.egov.usda.gov/nwcc/view?intervalType=+View+Current+&report=WYGRAPH×eries=Daily&format=plot&sitenum=766&interval=WATERYEAR
Expecting a cold snowy April and fantastic 26\27 Winter as climate cycles. God is good.
ReplyDeleteThe impact to the ski areas is dreadful, but the impacts to the general global population are far worse. We will not turn away from fossil fuels any time soon. Without fossil fuels there is no meaningful fertilizer industry, and crop yields plummet. Then there’s the distribution issue. There’s 8 billion people to feed. World bank said net zero by 2050 would require mining as much copper as has been mined in human history in approximately 25 years. Clearly not possible never mind the impacts. Add in the AI race and its insatiable demand for power, China’s coal fleet the size of the rest of the world combined, and it’s unlikely we see a large bend in the global emissions curve in this decade or the next. It’s unfortunate. I’m not denying anthropogenic global warming, but I spend all my work analyzing the energy system and the requisite mass flows. It’s staggering and saying it is not an easy fix would be the greatest understatement in history.
ReplyDeleteYes, it's hard. So lets get to work.
DeleteAlmost like we should have started work on this 50 years ago. If only we were warned (hard emphasis on sarcasm).
DeleteThere are things us utah peeps can do: plant a summer garden an reduce reliance on industrial foodchain, compost food scraps so they don't rot in a landfill an produce methane, get a bike or bus pass an cut down on one car trip a week, convert lawns too low h20 turf or fully xeriscape for massive water savings. All these are easy an if everyone did it would make massive difference. small actions can create big changes.
ReplyDeleteThe new mid-Gad restaurant (constructed in '25-26) has an extended footprint that has encroached on the Snowbird SNOTEL more than the previous building. Mid-winter it was theorized that the snow depth sensor (used in the density calculation) has been reporting incorrectly because of human disturbance to the nearby snowpack and has had offset changes to accommodate for that. A new depth sensor with a narrower beam will be used to hopefully correct this issue in the future. This winter's SNOTEL SWE data have matched manual SWE measurements or have been corrected in daily values (00:00) to reflect recent field measurements. Hourly SNOTEL data is not QA/QC'd, and daily midnight values for the Wasatch are QA/QC'd weekday mornings.
ReplyDelete