Wasatch Weather Weenies

For the second year in a row, October has given us above average precipitation, but limited snowpack. Below are the numbers for accumulated precipitation in the Great Salt Basin based on SNOTEL stations.  Median for October (Green line) is 2.5". Last year we got 4.2".  This year, through yesterday (October 24, black line), we are at 4.1".  We'll probably add a bit to that before the month is over.   Sadly, in both months, nearly all of this precipitation ended up in the soil rather than the snowpack, with little snowpack water equivalent at the end of last October and little presently this October.   That isn't to say there isn't any snow.  There are upper-elevation sites with a few hints of snow, but nobody is over an inch of snowpack water equivalent.   If you are wondering, Snowbird is at 0.5".  We're basically near zero in Collins Gulch.   Source: Alta.  Downloaded 1205 MDT 25 Oct 2026 On the positive side, the so...

An upper-level trough is moving through Utah today (Thursday) and tomorrow, bringing with it some convective storms and eventually cooler temperatures.   Snow from the last storm is now almost gone.  The Mount Baldy webcam at Alta this morning shows the snow line has tretreated to nearly 10,000 feet with substantial losses even at upper elevations.  Although the Mt. Baldy summit is obscured, considerable rock and dirt is exposed in the Ballroom at center right of the photo.   Source: Alta.  Photo from about 7:45 AM 22 October 2026 Se, we are essentially starting over from here.  The situation for today and tomorrow is a bit of a crap shoot.  Today, snow levels will be too high for much in the way of accumulations.  Perhaps if we get a thunderstorm or thunderstorm complex today it can lower the snow levels down onto our highest peaks, but the RRFS ensemble shows the wet-bulb 0.5 level sitting over 11,000 feet until later this evening....

People keep asking me when it's going to snow.  My response? How the hell would I know? Things are grim.  It's OK to be cranky.   As a scientist, I like to look at the evidence.  I'm doing this at about 7:15 on a Wednesday night part way into a fine bottle of Chianti, which I find necessary to numb sting of the forecasts. Let's start with the GFS.  A paltry 0.04" of water and 0.7" of snow for Alta-Collins over the next week.  The Euro?  I don't have an equivalent graphic.  I've looked at the next 10 days.  it might have a few more scraps at times, but nothing to get excited about. The Utah Snow Ensemble?  Well, the Euro is in it along with 81 other forecasts from the European and US ensembles. It too is pretty grim.  The forecast below covers 10 days.  There's one member that produces just over 20 inches.  There's always hope.  There are 10 members total that produce more than 10 inches.  There's always hope...

A major transition in the structure of the jet stream will occur over the next few days, resulting in the development of an omega block over the Norh Pacific Basin and high-impact weather for northern California and the Northwest United States. The plot below is a combined sea level pressure (black contours) and dynamic tropopause (jet-stream level) forecast for 0000 UTC 18 November (5 PM MST Sunday). I have identified the jet stream over the North Pacific Basin and North America with a black line.  The forecast shows a deep low pressure system over the Sea of Okhutsk (at the tip of the L1 arrow).  Downstream of it, there is strong southerly flow at the surface.  L1 and the strong southerly flow ahead of it don't look at that disruptive, but combined with warming due to condensation in the precipitation system accompanying them (not shown), they serve as the proverbial straw that break's the camel's back.  By 0900 UTC 19 November (2 AM MST Tuesday), L1 has weakened, ...

Along with graupel, sastrugi is one of my favorite weather-related words and I saw plenty of it ski touring yesterday.   Sastrugi is defined by avalanche.org as "heavily wind eroded snow with wavy textures." Sometimes it looks rough or pockety.  In the photo below, it appears there is avalanche debris on this slope, but in reality it is all sastrugi.   In some areas, the sastrugi was dense wind board and generally supportive of a skier.  In others, it was actually somewhat soft and didn't ski to bad on the descent. Each turn was a mystery! Although I like sastrugi as a word, it's not my favorite snow surface to ski.  We can blame the sastrugi in this case on the multiday easterly wind event that has been affecting the Wasatch Range and Front since Thursday.  Observations from Alta's Mt. Baldy show the winds veering (turning clockwise) from southwesterly just prior to 1200 MCT 12 March (Tuesday) to north by 0000 MDT 14 March and then locking in wi...

A weak short-wave trough and moisture surge moving into northern Utah later today will bring cooler temperatures and a threat of a few showers and thunderstorms tomorrow.  The likelihood increases through tomorrow with isolated T-storms later today, scattered tonight, and showers likely tomorrow.   The NAM forecast valid at 1500 UTC (9 AM MDT) tomorrow morning shows the short wave trough and associated clouds and precipitation over central Utah. This isn't a major monsoon surge, so it won't be a drought buster, event if you happen to get a good downpour wherever you are.  The concerning part of the cool down is that while we will get some precipitation, there will also be dry thunderstorms, which are thunderstorms that produce lightning, but little to no precipitation.  Enjoy the modest cool down, but hope that we don't see many if any fire starts.   The extended model forecasts are putting an enormous ridge over the Pacific Northwest and southwest Can...

A high-amplitude upper-level ridge remains parked over western North America, but as shown in yesterday afternoon's 0000 UTC 23 Sep 500-mb height analysis, there is a potential fly in the ointment for Utah weather. Source: NOAA/ESRL The fly is the weak closed low that is sitting over the coast of Washington, which results from a weather feature that meteorologists call a coherent tropopause disturbance , or CTD.  A CTD is a localized cyclonic vortex, which is associated with counterclockwise rotation in the Northern Hemisphere and is strongest at the tropopause.  The tropopause separates the stratosphere from the troposphere. Source: NASA The CTD and closed low move into Nevada by tomorrow morning [1200 UTC (0600 MDT) 24 September]. A different perspective at this time is provided below by a 3-D colored representation of the tropopause, with cool colors indicating a lower tropopause and warm colors indicating a higher tropopause.  Note how the tropopause ...