There is a good sized storm coming in, hitting Mt Rainier with 110 mph winds tonight, and 24 - 42 inches of new snow by Thursday.

    Dennis Mattinson's forecast

NOAA predicts only 20% chance of snow for Whitney starting Thursday night. Here's hoping the storm comes more southward!

    NOAA Mt Whitney Weather (From the Weather link on the left)

    Mount Rainier Recreational Forecast


Image from The Weather Channel, US: West Coast Satellite:




And this from yesterday, from my weather-watchers on Washington's Puget Sound:

doesn't have to move much to the south - Mono Hot Springs is getting a 90% chance of precip on Friday

http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php...119.017&e=0

Lynaroo: Actually, both of em.

From the Mt Rainier snowshoer story:
Kim, a U.S. citizen for 30 years, was leading 16 members of a hiking and climbing club from Tacoma on Saturday when he slid down a slope and became separated. He thought he would meet up with the group farther down the trail but became disoriented and went the wrong way.

This underscores how easy it is to get lost! Sure glad he made it.

<giddy><giggle><jumping>

Break out the new pow skis!!!

Bring it!

Hey, Moose!

Take a look at the IR Satellite photo posted above and note the color of the incoming snow.

Yup ... orange.

CaT

Problem is, Mono Hot Springs sits in the San Joaquin River valley, which runs up to the west side of Mammoth. It is the "chink" in the armour of the Sierra massif. As such, it concentrates weather, which is why Mammoth consistantly gets the highest snowfall in the Sierra.

For Whitney, the Great Western Divide is a huge barrier, and pulls a lot of moisture out of the fronts.

I think the chances for a higher than normal year are gone.

If you look at this graph, you can see why:

http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cdecapp/precipapp/get5SIPrecipStaticIndex.action

If you take where we are today, at 4 inches, and apply the green curve from that point until May 1 (when the snow pretty much is done), you will find that if we have the same precip that we had in the biggest year recorded, we will end up with about 40 inches.....which is the average since 1956.

That's if we, starting today, have the largest precip in history.

To have a BIGGER than average year, we would need to break every record, from here out. Possible, yes. but less likely every day that passes.

And this one is fizzling. Just got off the phone with a friend in Mammoth who says its raining at her home at 8K.

<skis crying in the corner>

Seek info from higher sources. It's been raining in town but snowing at the main lodge and above through the storm. The snow has been heavy and wet but it was covering the crusty areas yesterday and sticking to them well. When I visited the library in town after skiing, it was rain there.

Mammoth Mountain claims 19" for the storm.

Dale B. Dalrymple

Fresno - we have hail right now!

Info sought and gathered: 19" of pow on The Mountain ain't no good if you've only got one lift open. Stayed home and had an amazing walk up into the Whites instead. We'll see what tomorrow brings.

Sadly, there was a weather-related death in Yosemite. Details in the Mercury News.

Fresno receives record rain.

"Snow fell near the 8,000-foot level with Tuolumne Meadows reporting 12 inches of snow. Isolated showers in the Valley are possible today before the next storm is expected to arrive this afternoon and linger into Monday."

Fresno got another drenching last night, so I am thinking that Mt Whitney is getting more snow from the same storm today.

I zoomed out the Whitney webcam, since today's weather appears to be dumping on Mt. Whitney, and all we could see was a big gray cloud. I was hoping the Alabama Hills would have some snow.

The Mt Williamson webcam shows some snow in the foreground, and as I write this, the current picture shows snowflakes in the view.

And here's MooseTrack's back patio in Bishop this morning: