Obviously the biggest difference from a weather-standpoint is the breakdown of that ridge of high-pressure. We had a mix of low-pressures storm fronts moving in over the west coast, in particular a nastly little warm-low that blew through Southern California.
Check out the Current NOAA/NWS national map.
See all those big “L’s” spread across the western half of the US? Those are all of the storms that are currently shellacking resorts all over the region.
The mix of that warm low-pressure and another colder front pushing in from the Gulf of Alaska has really supercharged the weather across the Sierras (and now the Rockies) and it planning on dropping a ton of snow over the next few days.
Already resorts from SoCal’s Bear/Summit conglomerate, to Central Cal’s Mammoth Mountain, on up through Oregon’s Mt. Bachelor and Mt. Hood, have seen several inches of new powder, and in a few spots we have snowfalls that are being measured in ‘feet’ rather than inches.
Well for the West Coast there is more activity expected for the next couple of days...there is a whole series of fronts moving down out of the Gulf of Alaska and the mid-latitudes of the North Pacific that are going to grind over the coast as we head through midweek. These new fronts are colder, and a little bit drier, than the ones we just had ride through but they are still planning on dumping anywhere from 6-12” of new powder across the Sierra’s resorts.
Further out it looks like a couple of weaker fronts could move through later in the week setting up some light snowfall for later in the week.
In the Rockies, as well as Utah –Idaho -Montana, the storm that just tagged the West Coast is still pushing through. It hasn’t dried out a ton after moving over the Sierras, so there is still plenty of new snow…spots like Aspen and Telluride are expecting another 8-12” of new snow over the next 24-hours. At resorts further north it looks like it will be a little lighter…say around 6-10” but there will be pockets of heavier pow-pow in select areas.
There will be a break in the weather for the Rockies around midweek but we can expect the increasing west coast storm activity to continue to push east later in the week and possibly set up more snowfall and winter-storm conditions by next weekend.
Check out the NOAA extended range graphical forecast…you can see the slight break between storms but new snow activity is still reaching out across the US.
Further East it looks like we have the tail-end of some Canadian cold fronts pushing through the always freezing ass cold NE. This storm is still dropping snow light snow over parts of Maine and New Hampshire…but not much else. The latest storm front moving off the Rockies will move over the region in about 3-days so we can expect some increasing winter weather and the possibility of a lot of new snow by the second half of the week.
All in all I think that the West Coast and Rockies resorts are going to be a good call over the next week, if you can stand some snow, higher winds, and general winterness. There is going to be a lot of new snow cover for fresh tracks. Hope you get a chance to get some.
Check back the next forecast will be heading your way on Monday!
