After a January that was chock full of storms in the western United States, it looks as though much of February will be without precipitation as a strong high pressure ridge is currently setting up across the Great Basin. Models are predicting that the ridge of high pressure will push the majority of moisture north across Canada before dipping down into the plains and northeast. As of now, record temperatures are predicted for much of the west with models projecting temperatures to rise to 63° in Reno, Nevada.
Although this trend is pointing towards groomer and bump skiing across the west for the month of February, the warming period doesn’t mean winter is over in the west. Quite the contrary in fact. During the epic 2010/2011 La Niña season that saw Squaw with 811″ of snow, Olympic Valley saw virtually no snow from January 1st to February 15th. That year, the spring delivered big time and this year could see similar results.
Worried about the snowpack? Here’s what NOAA had to say:
“Don’t worry about the snowpack though! Most of it will still be there when temperatures trend back colder toward the middle/latter half of the month. Warm periods like this one are not that unusual for the Sierra and Great Basin.” –NWS Reno
In the meantime, forecasts are calling for moisture to return to the Tahoe region later this month as the ridge begins to break down, allowing precipitation to return to the Tahoe region, Utah, and Colorado.
“Longer range outlooks indicate a transition back to a wetter pattern the end of February into the start of March.”– NWS Reno
The Good = East Coast Snow Showers/Cold Temperatures
This change in pressure will open the door for colder temperatures and more frequent intermountain snow storms to hit the east without the predominant coastal focus we saw during Superstorm Jonas. Bottomline: All is not lost for the east coast just yet, which is contrary to the snow reports out of Mad River Glen…
“It has been a mild winter, but now would be a good time to prepare for much colder air temps arriving next weekend.” NWS Buffalo
And with the following forecasts, the MRG snow reports are becoming a little bit more optimistic.
