Friday, January 31, 2014

Ski Resorts breath a sigh of relief. Next one upstream is Sunday.

Last night was a bust all over the state as the second wave just failed to produce.  Got its axis all wrong.  At least the first wave has made a difference in the Sierra snow pack.  Heavenly was the big winner this round, claiming 26 new inches of snow.  Of course that is all at the upper elevations, with under a foot at the California Base.  Up on the north side Squaw reported 10" and Rose 15", with Kirkwood in the south reporting 16, um, and a half, inches.  Anyway, new terrain is opening up.  This was a good, wet, base building snow, with a bit of fluff on top.  So, I imagine there is some decent stuff to ferret out.  But it will be busy up there, so stay safe.  Speaking of safe, if you are planning on heading out into the BC, use extreme caution as avalanche danger is still very high.  The old facets still exist in many places.  Allow this snow pack to settle and stabilize some.  As for the weather here in Santa Cruz, Saturday is looking similar to today, although with a bit less wind.  That is nice.  It was pretty windy out there today.  Sunday could be wet.

The latest model run of the GFS has us barely getting swiped by the system moving north to south just off shore.  Showers are looking more and more likely.  Not much of a rain or snow maker for the state, as this one is mostly to our west.  A slight shift in track, though, and we could see a whole lot more water.  An half to over an inch is expected just a few hundred nautical miles to our north west.  Pray for rain.  Next systems moves through to our north on Monday, maybe clipping Tahoe.  That will help keep us in the 50s.  Maybe warming up to the 60s mid week.  After that things are up in the air.  Some models have us dry.  Others wet by Thursday.  Several have large scale troughs setting up along the western coastline by Monday the 10th or so.  Could be a wet month.  I can tell you the 18z model run of the GFS looks nice in the fantasy land portion of the forecast.  More on that as we work through the next week.

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