Snowpacks grow as valleys thaw

Puny snow levels from December are increasing throughout the region, according to the National Weather Service.

Charles Ross, a weather service hydrologist, said snowpacks were about 50 percent of average at Christmas, but that number has jumped to about 70 percent of normal since then.

The same storms that brought warmer weather and rain to Spokane and Coeur d’Alene also hit the mountains, Ross said, meaning the local ski resorts are finally getting some of the snow they’ve pined for.

High-elevation snow is also good news for river levels, Ross said, and flows are higher than they have been in recent years.

Compared with 2004 temperatures, the final weeks of 2005 began to heat up like a spring thaw – on Christmas Eve the temperature was 52 degrees, 20 degrees higher than in 2004.

“We were in the freezer until about Dec. 20,” Ross said. “But the last 11 days, the temperatures were rising and above average.”

New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day were both about 10 degrees warmer than the prior year, Ross said, coming in at 46 degrees and 43 degrees, respectively.

“It was a mild and rainy New Year’s,” Ross said. Last New Year’s, “we had a couple of inches of snow on the ground.”

Snow levels have been low in the city, Ross said, with about 4.4 inches of total snow in December 2005, compared with the 13.7-inch average.

“The same weather that’s bringing floods in California is bringing snow to our mountains,” Ross said. “For some people who like only mountain snow, that’s good. But for others who like snow – like me – we just have to cope.”