Tahoe Daily Snow

Heads up, there may be fresher snow! Read the latest Tahoe Daily Snow

By Bryan Allegretto, Forecaster Posted 10 years ago January 28, 2014

Tuesday PM Update:

I don't have to even say much. I'll quote the NWS discussion this afternoon as it recaps the model trends today. All good news!

"CHANGES THIS AFTERNOON INVOLVED INCREASING THE PRECIP AMOUNTS AND ALSO LOWERING SNOW LEVELS AS MODELS TREND A LITTLE FARTHER SOUTH AND COOLER. OF NOTE IS THAT THE EUROPEAN MODEL SHOWS A CLASSIC TONOPAH LOW PATTERN WITH A STRONG SURFACE LOW DEVELOPING NEAR TONOPAH THURSDAY. IF THIS OCCURS, IT WILL RESULT IN LOWER SNOW LEVELS DUE TO THE STRONG NORTH SURFACE PRESSURE/ISALLOBARIC GRADIENT."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTP-2YDwRYI&feature=youtu.be


From This Morning:

Summary:

The NWS hoists the Winter Storm Watch flag as we await what could be the biggest storm in over 13 months. (that's not saying much)  Their snowfall forecast on the watch is similar to what we have been discussing the last few days. The rain/snow starts Wednesday night, changing to snow Thursday and lasting into Friday.  Cold air over the weekend with a chance of snow showers Sunday.  Then cool weather next week with the next chance of snow coming Thu-Fri.

Details:

Not too many changes in the past 24 hours.  The forecast models disagree slightly with timing of the main push of heavy precip and how long it lasts, but they are in decent agreement on total precip.  The GFS has precip starting as early as Wednesday afternoon with the rest of the models bringing in precip by Wednesday night.  The initial band of precip is from a sagging cold front pushing South down the coast very slowly.  The snow levels will start out around 8000 ft. before falling closer to 7000 ft. Wednesday night.

As a low approaches Northern CA on Thursday the cold front pushes further South.  The combination of the two will increase precip and lower snow levels close to lake level.  The question is on the timing of the system pushing in off the Pacific.  The GFS has it pushing in as late as Thursday night.  This will determine when the heaviest snow falls.  The later the heavier precip the more of it that will be snow at lake level as the cold front continues to push cold air in from the North.  It looks like snow showers will linger into Friday behind the front.

The question of snow totals at lake level continues to be on how fast the cold air works in.  It looks like mostly all snow from 7000 ft. and up on Thursday.  The forecast models have increased total precip amounts slightly which makes the timing even more interesting.  

GFS

GFS 1/28

Canadian

Canadian 1/28

Euro

Euro 1/28

As you can see they are pushing the 2+ inch precip amounts towards the Tahoe Basin.  I am going to stick with the forecast from the last few days but even with the snow level drop timing I'm a little more confident in the higher end of the forecast totals.  1-2 feet above 8000 ft., 8-18 inches above 7000 ft, and 4-12 inches at lake level.  Along the crest, especially in the NW corner of the lake we could have higher amounts as the liquid amounts on the models this morning approach 3 inches of liquid.

We have much colder air in place over the weekend behind the front.  Another low will approach the coast on Sunday.  Most model runs have it dropping down the CA coast keeping the precip to our West.  The GFS is the furthest East with some light snow showers.  There is still a chance it comes further inland so we will keep watching that.

Long-Range:

Next week looks to start out cool and dry as the trough shifts slightly East and a weak ridge builds off the coast.  The models are showing a system sliding down the West Coast next Thursday-Friday.  That will be the next chance of snow that we will watch.

The second half of week 2 it looks like the trough with lots of cold air will expand West in Canada and will try to push into the West.  There will also be a ridge trying to build over the Southwest.  The question will be can the trough push into CA or will it stay to our North.  We will go back into a dry pattern or a cold and snowy one?  The GFS is still waffling and the Euro has a cold and snowy pattern.  Still plenty of time to watch this after the current storm.

P.S. if you are still not following the Facebook page or Twitter you are missing out on lots of alerts, updates, and pictures between these posts.  Also, make sure you are going to the main opensnow.com forecast page and clicking on CA or NV to see the detailed forecasts for each mountain.  Each resort has its own page with its own snowfall forecast, snowfall report every morning, and time-lapsed web cams.

Stay tuned...BA

About Our Forecaster

Bryan Allegretto

Forecaster

Bryan Allegretto has been writing insightful posts about snow storms for over the last 15 years and is known as Tahoe's go-to snow forecaster. BA grew up in south Jersey, surfing, snowboarding, and chasing down the storms creating the epic conditions for both.

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