There was an excessive amount of rainfall Monday throughout Northern California. However, that didn’t translate into snow at Lake Tahoe ski resorts
With the exception of Kirkwood Mountain and its 7 inches of new snow Monday, most Lake Tahoe ski resorts received minimal or zero snow by Tuesday morning.
But there could be better news Wednesday morning. According to the National Weather Service (NWS), the storm could dump up to 12 inches of snow above 7,500 feet elevation.
The NWS is also predicting that between 4-12 inches of snow accumulation at 7,000-7,500 feet could happen in the Lake Tahoe region, with up to 2 inches possible down to 6,500 feet.
Any snow accumulation would be a relief in the Sierra, where snowpack is well below average – a point stressed after a record-setting water year in 2016-17. Snowpack across the Sierra stood at 24 percent of normal on Jan. 3, when California water managers completed the first manual snowpack assessment of the season.
Resorts received some needed snow at the end of last week on Friday and early Saturday. Mt. Rose in Nevada reported 10 inches and Kirkwood received 7 inches.
Kirkwood has received the most snow accumulation over the past week with 18 inches in the seven-day period. Not far behind is Northstar-at-Tahoe with 15 inches.
Heavenly Mountain reported 9 inches of new snow over the past seven days, while Sugar Bowl and Sierra-at-Tahoe reported 5 inches.
Snow Totals (Tuesday morning)
- Boreal Mountain: 0
- Donner Ski Ranch: 0
- Diamond Peak: 1
- Granlibakken: 0
- Heavenly Mountain: 2
- Homewood Mountain: 0
- Kirkwood Mountain: 7
- Mt. Rose: 3
- Northstar California: 4
- Sierra-at-Tahoe: 4
- Soda Springs: 0
- Squaw Valley: 3
- Sugar Bowl: 2
- Tahoe Donner: 0
