Benjamin Spillman

Reno (Nev.) Gazette-Journal

RENO, Nev. — One sure sign the Sierra Nevada is experiencing a historic winter is the snowpack is getting too deep for devices scientists use to measure it.

It’s a problem that cropped up Wednesday when researchers sought to confirm snow depth at a data site on Slide Mountain at Mount Rose Ski Tahoe near Reno.

“We’re not even close,” hydrologist Jeff Anderson said after jamming an aluminum tube more than 16 feet into the snowpack hoping to reach the ground below.

The snow-measuring snafu provided real life confirmation of what scientific instruments on the site already showed.

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The Sierra Nevada is wrapping up a historic winter and that’s huge news for Nevada and California, states that have spent the past several years parched in drought.

“Who would have thought this two years ago when we were measuring the worst snowpack on record,” Anderson said.

The snowpack is 212 inches deep at the Slide Mountain SNOTEL site. Water content at the site was 74.6 inches, meaning there’s more than six feet of water in the 17-foot snowpack. It’s a record for March 1 at the site.

The previous record for March 1 snow water equivalent at the site was a little more than five feet in 1997. The overall site record was more than seven feet of snow water equivalent in May 1995.

Since Oct. 1, the first day of what’s referred to as the “water year,” there’s been nearly eight feet of precipitation at the Slide Mountain site. Much of it has been rain but there’s plenty of snow.

Mount Rose Ski Tahoe has measured a total of about 54 feet since the beginning of ski season.

The total precipitation so far makes it the second-wettest year at that SNOTEL site, with seven months remaining in the water year.

An average year at the site sees a little more than four-and-a-half feet of precipitation.

The big numbers aren’t limited to one SNOTEL site.

The overall snowpack in the Truckee River Basin is 207% of normal for the date. The Lake Tahoe Basin snowpack is at 220%. The Carson River Basin is at 210%. The Upper Humboldt Basin, which is an important basin for rural northern Nevada, is at 156%.

California’s March 1 snowpack totals are equally impressive.

At the Phillips snow course site south of Lake Tahoe the water content jumped from 28 inches at the beginning of February to more than 43 inches March 1. Snow depth was more than nine feet.

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Statewide, the California snowpack is at an estimated 185% of normal for the date.

In fact, there’s more snow now than there usually is on April 1, when the snowpack tends to peak.

“We busted through April 1 values pretty much at all snow courses throughout the state,” said Frank Gehrke, chief of the California Cooperative Snow Surveys Program.

Although the impressive snowpack has delivered much-needed drought relief the region still faces long term environmental challenges due in large part to global climate change.

Nighttime lows in the Sierra Nevada are trending warmer and the mean freeze level is getting higher. Both trends threaten to make large snowpack winters less frequent in the future.

A greater percentage of precipitation coming in the form of rain instead of snow and irregular snow-melt cycles makes it more difficult for communities to capture water for public use.

“Instead of making its way into our faucets, the snow we have now could be washed away into the ocean,” said Juliet Christian-Smith, senior climate scientist and water expert at the Union of Concerned Scientists, wrote in a statement about the California snowpack. “Even in heavy snow years like this one, global warming is the wild card in our water security.”

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