Tahoe Daily Snow

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By Bryan Allegretto, Forecaster Posted 1 year ago January 26, 2023

Dry & Breezy thru Sat, Colder w/ Snow Sunday...

Summary

The dry pattern lasts through Saturday. Colder air and snow showers move in Sunday. Clearing but cold Monday into Tuesday. Drier weather likely continues through the 2nd. An active pattern to our north from the 3rd - 9th could track a storm far enough south to bring us some snow.

Short Term Forecast

No significant changes to the short or long-range forecasts this morning (Thursday). We have mostly sunny days through Saturday with highs in the 30s to near 40 degrees down at lake level.

The gusty northeast winds are still gusting up to 50+ mph over some of the peaks early Thursday morning. They are forecast to come down through the day. Then northwest winds increase Friday with gusts up to 30+ mph over the ridges by afternoon. West winds increase Saturday with ridgetop gusts up to 40+ mph by afternoon.

So as the title says, "Dry & Breezy through Saturday".

Shot of Cold & Snow:

A cold trough digs south through CA Sunday bringing in colder air and some snow showers. Highs drop into the 20s with snow breaking out over the Tahoe basin during the early morning hours through the day on Sunday.

front

The latest model runs show the system dropping south a bit faster with scattered snow showers Sunday evening clearing out by Monday morning now. That has decreased the total precipitation forecasts slightly from an average of around 0.44 inches on the high-end Wednesday morning to 0.38 inches this morning. With the track north to south over the Sierra we could similar totals east to west.

euro precip

It will be cold which will help to fluff the snow with higher snow ratios and powdery snow falling. That allows more air between the flakes as they accumulate, so we can get higher snowfall totals than in a warmer storm with the same amount of liquid. Here's my updated snowfall forecast for totals by Monday morning.

snowfall totals

The forecast is down around an inch from yesterday due to the faster movement of the storm and clearing by Monday morning. The latest forecasts show lighter winds for Sunday.

Then Monday we have partly-mostly sunny skies and highs only in the teens on the mountains and 20s for lake level. Overnight lows drop into the single digits Sunday and Monday night, and maybe below zero in some spots! It stays cold into Tuesday.

cold

I'm only updating the forecast for the Short-Term section this morning as the Extended Forecast ideas haven't changed. The models are still struggling with how far south storms will track into CA during a more active pattern for the Pacific NW that starts later next week.

Extended Forecast

The cold trough that digs into the region Sunday is forecast to shift to our east starting Tuesday the 31st, while a second trough develops off the West Coast through February 2nd.

ridge

That could pump a ridge over the West Coast for the 1st-2nd, with the break in storms continuing and a warming of high temperatures. We could see some gust

More Active Pacific NW:

By February 3rd, the trough is forecast to push into the West Coast.

trough 2

There is disagreement among the deterministic models on how far south this trough digs into CA. They show an active storm track into the Pacific NW and far northern CA starting around the 3rd through the 9th, but shift every other run with how far south they dig the storm into the Sierra.

This is the shift to a more active West coast pattern that we were watching for in the fantasy range for a while now, which we were thinking could be set up for the first week of February. The long-range models have it shifted 2 days to the 3rd-9th. While it looks to become more active to our north, we'll have to see if wetter storms will track far enough south to hit the northern Sierra.

The ensemble mean models are still in good agreement that we see a wetter period with near to above-average precipitation in the northern Sierra during this 7-day period.

wet

We'll continue to watch the trends as we get closer to see if we could get the snowfall going again for February.

Fantasy Range:

Beyond the 9th, the long-range models continue to show high-pressure building back in closer to the West Coast. 

ridge 2

That could bring us below-average precipitation through most of the rest of the month.

drier pattern

The storms we do see could be similar to Sunday's system where they track down from the north over land and are moisture starved. Hopefully, we see a few decent storms or maybe the long-range models will shift their thinking with the overall pattern for February. We'll see...

I don't always give a pattern outlook out more than 2 weeks, but I'm just trying to set the expectation that February could be the first below-average snowfall and precipitation month since October. Then we can be pleasantly surprised by any good storms.

Stay tuned...BA

Announcements

Fresh Tracks!

This week The Flakes talk about the Snow Returning to the Northeast, chat with Julien Ross about the Great Snow in New Mexico, report Snowfall Around the rest of The U.S., look at the Snowfall Forecast for The Upcoming Week, and discuss the Long-Range Snowfall Patterns.

crest

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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