4/19/2017 Update:

 

Our Atmospheric River shifted south late yesterday, leaving 2.17 inches of water in the Rain/Snow melt tip bucket this morning. Mammoth Pass picked up another 4.00+ inches of water and Mammoth Mt reports a storm total of 18 to 26 inches of fresh snowfall.  A big story this morning is that Mammoth Mt crossed the 600 inch mark for snowfall for the season with 605 inches.   However, the bigger story is the amount of snow and water that has fallen out of the skies over the past 6 to 7 months. That is 98.57 inches of water. This is most likely a record.  Crossing the 100 inch threshold is going to be the biggest news when it happens!   Sure a 600 inch snowfall winter is note worthy, but a 100 inches of water from both snow and rain is nothing short of amazing!

I am expecting a few showers tonight followed by a beautiful sunny warm weekend!   It will be windy next week with a slight chance of showers…..

 

Dr Howard and the Dweebs………………………….:-)

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The Great winter of 2017 continues to wind down. The upcoming week shows the likelihood of light to possibly moderate precipitation at times through Thursday. There is a weak to moderate AR in process. This is acting to keep the snow level closer to the freezing level which is more common during air masses that are very moist. The freezing level will be on the high side today Monday and through Tuesday night.  As a result, precipitation will fall mostly as rain or snow or in town as the freezing level remains well above 8500 to 9000 ft.

Monday night and Tuesday would be best chance of accumulating snowfall at 8000 to 8500 feet. But being that the roads are so warm, there will likely be just some slush to deal with over the higher elevations of town.  Snowfall amounts will be in the 1 to 3-inch range Monday night into Tuesday, mainly the Village west. It will be especially breezy to windy, through the middle of this week.

On Mammoth Mountain, the guidance suggests that between the period of Sunday the 16 and Thursday the 20th, the upper mountain may get 2 feet plus at elevations above 10,000 feet. It will be wet snow at the main lodge with amounts more in the 8 to 12 inch range This is not from one storm. Rather the combination of three between Sunday night and Thursday evening.

It is important to mention here that this week’s storminess will be followed by a beautiful Spring weekend with much above normal temperatures. However, the European model runs still favors more unsettled weather the following week. The American Model the GFS is dry for the same period.   Whether a storm for week 2 shows up or not, expect an update on that later this week. Comment: (Does it not usually storm on the fishing opener?)   As a note, the Dweebs feel there will be a few storms in May and possibly June as well. We have yet to see the Cut-Off lows over the Great Basin develop this season. They will show up eventually!

 

Weather Discussion:

The blocky pattern over Alaska currently in process suppressing the upper jet stream south over Central CA will be retrograding westward later this week.  This change in pattern usually signals a northward shift in the upper jet stream and an extended period of fair weather for California. There is even the possibly of our first real Spring thaw for the Eastern Sierra this upcoming weekend into early the following week with highs near 70!  In the meantime, it will be windy this week until that change in pattern mentioned above kicks in.  I expect high temps to cool to the upper 40s through mid-week then a warm up through the weekend.