It was a beautiful weekend as a majority of the ski resorts had their final weekend of skiing for the 20/21 season. I got out for some sun and a few turns at Sugar Bowl Sunday afternoon. We are now down to just Squaw & Mammoth open for skiing and areas outside of ski resorts.

Monday:

The nice weather continues for Monday. It will be mostly sunny with highs into the 60s at lake level and 50s for the upper mountains.

Tuesday - Wednesday:

We have another weak system that is going to drop down from north to south down the eastern side of CA Tuesday into Wednesday. That will bring us a slight cooldown with highs only in the 50s, and 40s above 8000 ft. 

We should see mostly sunny skies in the mornings and then clouds popping up later in the day, with scattered showers popping up over the mountains. The best chance to see showers looks to be Tuesday with showers possibly staying south of the Tahoe region Wednesday.

The snow levels look to stay above 8000 ft. this time. The showers will be light and scattered for the most part, but a few isolated heavier cells are possible. Overall the blended models show 1-2 tenths of an inch of precip at best over most areas.

Most peaks should see up to a coating of snow at best if they see showers, but a few heavier cells could bring 1-3 inches of snow to the higher peaks, and just rain expected for the lower elevations.

Thursday - Saturday:

As the low-pressure system departs we should see drier weather with sunny skies through Saturday. Highs warming back into the 50s to near 60 degrees at lake level. Winds could start to become a little breezy on Saturday as a trough begins to dig into the West Coast by Sunday into Monday...

We have been talking about the possibility of a change in the pattern during the last week of April. In last Monday's post, I went through the reasons why we could see a shift in the pattern. We now have a storm within the 7-day window that we can talk about today.

All of the models have become consistent over the last couple of days in showing a storm moving into CA Sunday into next Monday. We will be tracking this system all week. It has the potential to pull in a decent amount of moisture by late April standards.

It also has the potential to have enough cold air for low snow levels down near lake level. Both of those factors make this an interesting system. It is too early to talk about potential snowfall yet, we will wait until Wednesday.

The latest model runs mostly show less than an inch of total precip, but the GFS model has over 2 inches! Here is a look at the Europen ensemble mean model.

We will continue to watch this system all week. If the forecast trends continue, it has the potential to bring accumulating snowfall to the mountains, and maybe even a little down to lake level by Monday. Could we have a fresh snow day at Squaw & Mammoth next Monday after being in the 60s this Monday (today)? We'll see...

Fantasy Range:

The long-range models suggest that the active storm track shifts back to our north by the middle of next week. We may go back into a pattern where weaker systems could bring enough moisture for afternoon showers again into the first week of May...

Stay tuned...BA

Ski Resort Closing Dates: 

Squaw/Alpine - 5/31 (tentative)

Mammoth - 5/31 (tentative)

Mt. Shasta - CLOSED

Tahoe Donner - CLOSED

Boreal - CLOSED

Sugar Bowl - CLOSED

Northstar - CLOSED

Homewood - CLOSED

Mt. Rose - CLOSED

Diamond Peak - CLOSED

Heavenly  - CLOSED

Sierra at Tahoe - CLOSED

Kirkwood - CLOSED

Bear Valley - CLOSED

Dodge Ridge - CLOSED

June Mountain - CLOSED

China Peak - CLOSED