Tip of the Iceberg: Uncovering the Effects of the Early March Blizzard in California
Local runner Jenelle Potvin goes on her daily jog along Bridge Street on Friday, March 1, 2024, in Truckee, Calif. Source: AP Photo
A blockbuster blizzard left 126 inches of snow in four days in Sugar Bowl, a ski resort located near Lake Tahoe in California, among many other regions.
In January, the Sierra Nevada was not expecting an abundance of snow. California’s snowpack was at levels less than half of normal.
In fact, snow drought was a concern across the western United States for many experts. But starting on Thursday, February 29, an unanticipated amount of snow covered parts of California following a major blizzard. However, things have played out differently in the majority of the U.S. – Many regions lack healthy snow levels.
The past season was labeled the “lost winter” in parts of the country because of unusually meager snowfall and higher temperatures compared to previous years. California defied this trend. Experts say the contrast boils down to El Niño's influence on weather patterns and temperatures.
El Niño is a meteorological phenomenon that can affect the weather significantly. It happens when warmer waters cause the Pacific jet stream to move south of its neutral position, and the Pacific jet stream also spreads east. During El Niño, trade winds weaken. Warm water is pushed back east, toward the west coast of the Americas.
With this shift, the northern U.S. is dryer and warmer than usual. But in the U.S. Gulf Coast and Southeast, these periods are wetter than usual and experience increased flooding.
El Niño winters often start slowly in California before bringing numerous storms throughout February and March. Storms this year, however, have been more frequent and intense throughout February, building up to a blizzard beginning in late February that left 5 to 10 feet of snow at the peaks of the Sierra Nevada.
High snow lines are common during El Niño winters when California’s storms are wetter and warmer. This can result in above-normal snow at higher elevations, but at lower elevations, rain is more common than snow. The early March blizzard was one of the few times in months when the snow line dropped to the Sierra Nevada foothills. In recent years, the foothills have seen higher snow lines and rain as a result of climate change.
Though snow conditions improved in California and other parts of the Southwest, winter was experienced differently for the majority of the U.S.
The main contributor to the lack of snow was the warm winter. The average temperature in the continental U.S. was over 5 degrees above normal from December to February.
The warmer conditions in the majority of the United States are linked to climate change and global warming, but whether the blizzard in California was a result of climate change is not quite certain. While there is no definitive agreement in the scientific community that climate change influences the El Niño Effect linked to the blizzard, recent studies suggest that global heating may be leading to stronger El Niño events.
Despite its challenging consequences, the recent storms in the west have greatly benefitted the snowpack and canceled out the droughts across the region—especially in California. Winter storms have refilled water reservoirs and dampened the parched landscape.
The recent California blizzard lifted snowpack levels considerably. Snowpack levels are now normal across the state for March, and nearly all of the state’s major reservoirs are above historic averages. These higher reservoir levels are expected to alleviate pressure on California’s groundwater reserves.
Both California and Nevada are “drought-free,” and other regions of the U.S. have been impacted similarly by the winter storms. The giant reservoirs of the Colorado River Basin, Lakes Mead and Powell, are now about one-third full. Although still far from their historic peaks of the early 2000s when they were 95% full, the water levels are up from the same time last year, when they were 25% full.
Despite these outstanding effects of the wet winter storms, the long-term western water crisis is here to stay. “I like to say it is a collision of 19th-century water law, 20th-century infrastructure and 21st-century population growth and climate change,” explains Brad Udall, senior scientist at Colorado State University.
California seems to be safe from the prospect of a major drought any time soon due to the high water table resulting primarily from powerful winter storms. Currently, only about 25% of the western U.S. is in drought conditions—down from 51% this time last year. California weather expert Ken Clark says, “The combination of the abundance of rain and snow from the winter of 2022-2023, the state of the reservoirs, and what has happened this winter gives a high confidence that drought conditions will remain absent in California well into 2025."
The early March blizzard was an anomaly compared to the majority of the U.S., which saw warmer and dryer temperatures, and there is no denying that it proved a challenge to navigate for many Californians. However, this wet winter storm acted as a significant defense mechanism against California’s historic threat of droughts.