We are tracking another big wear
system off the Pacific Coast.
Will it be another Fujiwara
effect or bomb cyclone?
Well, that is how we're going to
unfold this weather system here.
It's going to be making its way inland
by the time we get to Tuesday morning.
So you can see the bigger,
heavier bands of rain coming in and snow
for this year of piling up and a lot of
wind that will come with it as .
Right now it is a low pressure
system sitting off the coast he,
but there's another low just
down to the South of us,
a weaker low that looks
like it will get absorbed.
Into that bigger low and with i,
it will bring moderate to heavyn
and snow as well as windy conditions.
But the position of it looks lie
it won't be the higher impact
impacts like what we saw last w.
Nonetheless it is a cold storm,
snow levels down to about 2500 to 4000
feet and that means some of us t
we're just starting to clear ouf
the snow are going to see some .
We still have some concerns as l
with the heavier rain coming in because
we have two river systems that e
under a flood warning until further notice.
The San Joaquin and the Merced rivers still,
not only at flood stage,
but actually at danger stage.
This is going to be the San
Joaquin River at Bernales reachg
its latest peak at about 29.5,
and it looks like a wheel
flattened out there,
finally coming below that danger
stage by later in the week.
But again,
this is all going to have to account for
some of the new rain and snow coming in.
Then we head over to the Merced River
that looks like it's status quo as well,
staying at that flood stage.
For at least the time being as we track
yet another weather system coming in.
All that being said,
one of the looming things in the near
future is going to be our snow .
Because keep in mind,
April 1st is generally the time that we
start to see the peak snow melt coming
down the hill into our reservoi.
And right now,
when you account for both reserr
storage and snowpack,
the Orange Line right here represents
this year well above average
across much of the Tahoe Basin.
And this year as well,
this is what the snowpack
looks like right now.
And obviously our average
today and April 1st date,
well,
they're gonna come really close together
within the next couple of days.
They're actually going to be the same here,
but still tracking them.
And we've been sitting close
to that well above average for
almost the entire winter season
and spring season as well.
So our statewide average to dat,
225% of average.
And again,
that's going to be very close te
April 1st average of 228% of average.
All that snow melts down the hil
and fills our reservoirs.
So reservoir space right now is critical
and especially for the San Joaquin Valley,
which has a lot smaller tributas
out of those reservoirs for when
those water releases happen.
There's just not as much space s
say in extreme Northern Califora
for that water to move through.
And the reason why I mentioned
that is because I want to point
out that the central and southen
Sierra are particularly high,
in fact well above the 198283.
Max, when we had some flooding
back then as well,
once that snowpack starts to me,
that's when we could have
additional problems on our rive.
So it's not necessarily just abt
rainfall and snowfall at that t.
There is a delayed effect when we start
to get into the spring snow mel,
the northern Sierra just
a little bit behind that
19838283 Max. And in fact 2017 was a little
bit higher even for the northern Sierra.
But most of the biggest
concerns could indeed be.
In the near future for the San Joaquin
Valley, as we start to see those rivers
rise as the reservoir releases e
to happen because of the snow m,
our reservoir conditions right ,
Shasta last week finally above %
of the historical average, 80% .
That is good news for our drought situation
because that's our biggest reservoir in
the state that tends to feed mof
the state with the water that we need.
Oroville at 118% of average.
That came up pretty quickly.
And so right now it's 82% full Folsom,
a smaller reservoir,
it feeds more of the metropolitn
areas around Sacramento,
that's about 66% full right now,
but 110% of historical average
release is still periodically
happening on these river system.
And so just be aware that they d
to be running a bit higher right now.
As far as the Central Valley,
for the San Joaquin Valley in particular,
new Melonis down Pedro San Luis,
all roughly about 90 to over 100% of average.
Saint Louis,
that's a really good situation ,
96% of average that is both a
Central Valley project as well
as the state water project.
So that's a nice shared reservoir that
is finally coming up to nearly full and
haven't seen that in several years as well.
Rainfall by water year,
a lot of people talk about, oh,
this is going to bust the droug,
this is so great.
Well,
the last drought,
drought busting year that we
had was 201617 and look at the
difference in total precipitati.
We had over 30 inches,
almost 34 inches of rain for
downtown Sacramento this year.
We're well behind that,
closing in on about 24 1/2 inches of rain,
but still,
that's even behind that 2018-2019 water year,
which doesn't end until September 30th.
But as we dig deeper into this forecast,
you're going to see by the
time we get into April,
we generally don't see a whole
lot more rain after that.
Total rainfall throughout
the state is impressive.
San Francisco almost 30 inches
of rain just since October 1st.
For the water year again.
Sacramento,
about 24 1/2 Redding were
over 33 1/2 inches of rain.
The northwest part of Californis
particularly hard hit with this last drought,
and that can't be said for the ,
2016 drought that was more of
a Southern California issue.
Certainly Northern California
had its fair share of issues,
but we didn't get hit.
As hard as this last round of te
droughts and again our biggest reservoirs
are in the northern part of the state.
So this was a drought that hit s
especially hard with that situa.
All of us looking at above
average precipitation and even
Palm Springs coming in with the
about 1/10 of an inch behind,
not too bad considering that's in the desert.
So let's take a look at this next storm.
Is it going to be a bomb cyclon?
You know that always gets big headlines
and the key factors that we look at is,
is there going to be a
rapid pressure drop 24.
Yellow bars or more in 24 hours or less
will there be rapidly intensifying storm
with heavy rain and snow and damaging
winds and those damaging winds n
actually reach hurricane force strength.
So that's why it's so critical
to kind of keep an eye on that.
Or will it be that Fujiwhara eft
where we have two cyclones kind
of dancing around each other,
one is stronger,
one is weaker and what happens s
smaller one gets absorbed into e
the smaller one into the strong,
resulting in a stronger storm.
Much stronger winds and
heavier precipitation.
So let's take a look at this.
Well, it does not look like this
going to be a bomb cyclone agai,
that could certainly happen
within the next 24 hours.
But as these two storms combine,
it looks like that pressure difference
isn't going to be quite at that threshold.
But right now it does look like
a bigger storm is going to
be absorbing a smaller storm.
Bottom line here is we've got me
active weather in store for us
with snow and travel being on t.
Higher impacts,
wind playing in there as well in
the moderate to strong range stm
system just off the coast here h
the satellite just kind of show.
How those two storms are that
counterclockwise circulation jut
moving their way in from the Pacific.
We have roughly about 24 hours
before we start to see some of e
higher impacts of this storm sy.
But extreme impacts certainly ag
80 and north of I-80 into partsf
Plumas and Lassen counties South of Hwy.
50 around Mammoth getting some extreme
impacts with travel and heavy s.
And for the coastal range just
north of Clear Lake,
we'll see that as well with that winter
storm warning pretty much playing out
in that exact area with two to four feet.
Of additional accumulation.
Keep in mind that's going to be on top of
the already historic snowfall in some areas.
Wind gusts over 60 mph and lower snow levels
down to about 2500 feet in some pockets,
generally about 3000 to 4000 fe.
Putting snow again on places that were
just starting to melt some of te
winter snow storms that came through.
Or wind advisory goes into place late
on Monday last through Tuesday h
wind gusts at about 35 to 45 mp.
Now mostly Monday is a quiet da,
a good day to prepare for the
nasty weather heading our way.
Wind gusts really ramp up durine
morning on Tuesday and then stao
back off during the evening hou.
That will allow us to at least
get a break from the winds.
That can't be said though
for the rain because that
will continue to play into our forecast.
A little bit deeper into the workweek Tuesday
it all gets going rain along the coast.
Moving its way inland snow for
the northern part of the state.
Watch out along I-5, might have to get
chain up again near Redding on .
Be prepared for a lot of travel delays there.
And obviously watching for those
chain controls periodically pose
shutdowns once again along 80 and 50,
we've had a lot of avalanche
concerns along Hwy. 50.
That could indeed be another
factor in the forecast.
But Wednesday you can see that w
pressure system just poised off the coast
here will continue to give us showers in
the forecast at least and for this year.
Even though that lows moving South of us,
we'll hang on to that shower che
through early Thursday as well.
Total accumulation down low about 5 inches,
but in the higher elevations,
we're looking at close to about 22 to 36
inches and at some place 48 inches of snow.
For the valley,
about 1/2 an inch to an inch of rain.
And for the foothills,
we're closing in on about two to 2 1/2
inches of rain from this storm system.
If you're looking for spring
to come around anytime soon,
well, it is going to be likely
cooler and likely wetter.
In the forecast.
But as I mentioned earlier,
at this point in the season, liy
wetter doesn't mean a complete washout.
It just means that we'll be liky
wetter than 1.26 inches of rain.
Not too bad.
We're almost seeing that light
at the end of a very wet winter,
our 10 day forecast.
We've got another chance
of showers next weekend,
but the big one?
It's heading our way Tuesday into Wednesday.