Late storm dumps 3.5 ft on Tahoe area
A spring storm dropped about 3.5 feet of snow in the Tahoe/Truckee area on Sunday, reversing a dry March spell, and a related storm briefly closed a key Northern California interstate while helping Mammoth Mountain extend its ski season. (tahoedailytribune.com) (clickondetroit.com).
A weekend storm buried parts of the Tahoe and eastern Sierra with more than 3.5 feet of snow, jolting a fading ski season back to life. (tahoedailytribune.com) Palisades Tahoe and Kirkwood Mountain Resort each reported roughly 3.5 feet of new snow by Sunday, April 12, and OpenSnow forecaster Bryan Allegretto said April snowfall in the Tahoe area had reached about 70 inches. (tahoedailytribune.com) The same storm shut Interstate 80 over Donner Summit on Sunday in blizzard conditions, and chain controls were still in place early Monday on the main route between the Bay Area and Lake Tahoe. (clickondetroit.com) The timing was sharp because March had turned hot and dry across California, melting much of the Sierra snowpack weeks before the usual spring runoff. On April 1, the California Department of Water Resources found no measurable snow at Phillips Station, and the statewide Sierra snowpack stood at 18% of average. (water.ca.gov) That left many ski areas closing early. Tahoe Daily Tribune reported the new storm pushed the Tahoe season total to about 348 inches, or 88% of the seasonal average for mid-April, after weeks of losses. (tahoedailytribune.com) Farther south, Mammoth Mountain said the storm was enough to keep the resort open through Memorial Day, extending operations after a thin late-season stretch. The resort’s mountain report on April 13 said lifts were delayed by continued snowfall and 19 lifts were scheduled to run, conditions permitting. (clickondetroit.com) (mammothmountain.com) The Central Sierra Snow Lab measured 42.5 inches between Friday and Sunday, calling it helpful for building a late-season snowpack but still well below normal for the water year after the winter’s warmth. (clickondetroit.com) Forecasters were still not done. The National Weather Service office in Reno kept winter weather alerts posted on April 12, warning that travel around Tahoe could become very difficult to impossible as snow and ridge-top winds continued into Sunday night. (weather.gov) For ski towns that had been watching bare slopes spread in early April, the storm did not erase the winter’s deficits. It did, for a few days at least, make the Sierra look like spring had been put on hold. (tahoedailytribune.com)
