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By Bryan Allegretto, Forecaster Posted 2 years ago January 13, 2022

Windy Thu - Fri, The Dry Pattern Continues...

Summary

Mostly sunny for the next 10+ days. A few clouds are possible at times as weak systems fall apart as they move through the region. The pattern could begin to shift during the last week of January. Let's take a look at the progression and when storms could return...

Short Term Forecast

Not much has changed with the forecast Thursday morning. We are still stuck in a prolonged dry pattern, and will be for another 10+ days most likely.

We do have some clouds moving through the region from weak dry systems.

satellite

That system moving into the Pacific NW this morning will push a dry cold front through the region Thursday night. So it's going to feel a little unsettled Thursday with a few clouds and gusty winds. The forecast has increased for ridgetop winds. We could see southwest winds turning west Thursday with exposed ridgetop gusts up to 70+ mph. That could put some upper mountain lifts on wind hold.

Friday the winds start out lighter in the morning but then turn easterly and increase into the afternoon. We could see ridgetop gusts up to 60+ mph during the afternoon over exposed ridgetops. Highs in the 40s Thursday and cooling behind the front Friday into the 30s on the mountains and around 40 degrees at lake level.

The Weekend:

Sunny skies and lighter winds are expected for the weekend. Highs back into the 40s for the lower elevations and 30s for the upper mountains.

Extended Forecast

Over the 7-day period through next Thursday, the ridge over the West shifts to over the West Coast.

west coast ridge

That still blocks storms from moving into most of the West for the next 7 days. A few weak systems will try to move south through the Rockies, and some moisture into southern CA & AZ. But dry for the northern Sierra.

1 week precip

If you are looking for fresh snow the northeast is your best bet this week.

snow forecast

Week 2:

Week 2 starts on Friday the 21st through Thursday the 27th. The pattern looks pretty stagnant with high pressure anchored over the West Coast through the weekend of the 22nd-23rd. We should continue to see mostly sunny skies through then during the day with highs into the 40s.

Going into the last week of January, starting around the 24th, we have been seeing the long-range models suggest the pattern starts to shift. The ridge over the West Coast is forecast to begin shifting west-northwest away from the coast into the northeast Pacific. The question is does the ridge shift far enough West or north to allow storms into CA before the end of the month?

The GFS ensemble mean model, which is averaging 30 ensemble member runs, shows the highest pressure centered up over Alaska by the end of week 2 on the 27th.

gefs ridge Alaska

The Canadian ensemble mean model keeps the ridge close to the West Coast even though it shifts west just off the coast. The European ensemble mean model shifts the ridge NW and has it sitting a bit farther off the coast in the northeast Pacific. 

The difference would be a continuation of the dry pattern on the Canadian model, maybe some weak systems starting to move in on the European model...

euro ensembles precip

...and maybe some systems starting to undercut the ridge into CA on the GFS model.

gefs ensemble precip

I know that most of the deterministic model runs are not showing any storms moving into CA through the end of the month, but sometimes when the models are struggling with a pattern shift in the long range we can look at the ensemble mean runs to see if a shift is likely. Looking at the GFS ensemble members around 1/5th are completely dry through the 27th.

gefs members

Looking at the 50 members on the European ensembles around 2/5ths are completely dry for the next 2 weeks.

euro ensemble members 1

Euro ensemble members 2

Combined that's around 34% that are completely dry. In theory that gives us around a 66% chance that the pattern could shift enough between the 24th - 27th to start seeing at least some weak systems with light precipitation, lower if you include the Canadian ensembles. It would definitely start to feel better if we start seeing a storm or town the deterministic model runs consistently.

The latest GFS deterministic model run shows light snow possible for the Rockies for the next 2 weeks, but most of the snow is in the northeast.

2 week snow forecast

Fantasy Range:

A lot of times looking at things like stratospheric warming events, the active phase of the MJO moving, etc..., will give us a signal that the weather pattern could shift in the long-range. I'm not seeing much as far as long-range weather pattern signals that are clearly pointing in any direction yet. The extended range models continue to suggest the pattern becomes wetter into February, but I wouldn't trust anything beyond 10+ days right now.

We'll continue to watch the trends for the long range and try to see if there are any clearer signals that could suggest a stormy pattern returns to northern CA. For now, we hope the majority of the ensemble members are onto something the last week of month with at least some weak systems possibly returning. Until then or if not, we have dry weather through the extended outlook for now...

Stay tuned...BA

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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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