Is winter over?

I've only been in the NW for a few (great) snow years. Haven't seen such a dry year yet. If the offshore ridge that is keeping us dry sticks around through January, are we just going to go from late fall to late spring? Is there any hope that winter comes to anywhere below 5-7K'?

There have been a couple years in recent memory in which the snowpack didnt develop much before February. Even last year we had a robust December but January was dry and Feb and March were good.

My less-than-scientific observation from falls of 2012 and 2011 is that we had big storm cycles in mid to late November that allowed the ski areas to get open. Then things dried up in December and much of January. January of 2013 features a stretch of high pressure and inversion unlike any I ever remember. In both of those years I noted that the ski areas had been 'saved' by those November storms.

This year we didn't get the November storm.

Either the winter of 06-07 or 05-06 Snoq. Pass never really opened. I walked to Muir without flotation in mid-January and there was dry trail at Pebble Creek. So low-snow winters do happen.

I've only been here since 1993, but it seems to me that the winter season has shifted back 4-6 weeks; we've been getting more snow in March and early April than in December. Again, a non-scientific observation.

here are my general notes from snowpack below normal:
2000-2001 60%
2002-2003 60%
2004-2005 50%
2009-2010 80%

its been a while imo since we have had a very low year. the time is due.

the process is normal.

04-05 was the last real bad season, much worse than this year. I agree with others that PNW usually gets it early a little, then it really sets in mid February and can last into late April, May. 07-08, the record year, I remember the majority of that snowpack really hit in March!

Good to know that there is still hope! I wonder would this sporadic, perhaps "continential", pattern of infrequent storms couple with a maritime type of heavy snow create really dangerous avy conditions? At least until everything settles out in the late spring.

A high temperature of 69 Deg F at Paradise Today. Summer like temperatures for sure.

Telemetry from Paradise:

MM/DD Hour Temp RH Wind Wind Wind HourTotal 24HrTotalSolar
PST F % Avg Max Dir Prec Prec Snow Snow W/m2
5400'5400'5380'5380'5380'5400'5400'5400'5400'5400'

---

1 17 1000 56 11 0 0 303 0 0 74 95 260
1 17 1100 58 9 0 0 281 0 0 71 95 358
1 17 1200 58 10 0 0 346 0 0 72 94 408
1 17 1300 61 6 0 0 17 0 0 71 94 465
1 17 1400 67 6 0 0 76 0 0 72 93 419
1 17 1500 69 5 0 0 46 0 0 72 93 339
1 17 1600 62 8 0 0 133 0 0 68 93 215

In the PNW, low snow, terrible conditions for 1/2 the season doesn't exclude having some of the best powder days late Feb/March/early April.   

And, look on the bright side, the longer the dry spell, the better the ski deal this spring.

In the woeful, woeful PNW winter of 2005, I picked up two snowboards.

They were giving them away by March.

^^^^^This. sometimes the skiing is much better in low snow years than in stormy deep snow years. So far this year (Jan) skiing has been pretty good.

In the snowfall history at Snoqualmie Pass, the worst recorded decade of snow was the 1940's which was followed up in the 1950's with the snowiest decade. The only trend one finds is, it is very unpredictable. Snow storms follow the jet stream and this year it is going above us and hitting the mid-west/east. I'm still holding out hope we will go out strong.

hyak.net/snowfallhist.html

From what I hear this is definitely not the worst snow year on record!! 1981, the year I was born was clearly the worst snow year in the NW! No measurable amount of snow on any of the passes! So I guess we can count our blessings that we can at least ski this year, even if it is lousy. We also have to remember that there is still time for winter to catch up with February and March left to get snow, which normally we get most of our snow anyways. Lets just hope that is the case this year.

PacWest/Hyak installed snowmaking for the lower portion of the mtn after the 1981 season using the water from the Oly can. I hear it was pretty crude and was like skiing on ice balls, but would have been nice for winters like this if it were kept in place to cover the lower slopes. 76/77 was actually worse then 80/81 until March hit. 3 WA resorts filed bankruptcy after that season and 2 of the 3 never operated again.

Is winter over?

Nope.