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The effects of a “snow drought” are still plaguing parts of the West, after a stretch of warm, dry weather last month accelerated the season’s snowmelt, federal meteorologists reported. While California’s Sierra Nevada has received sufficient snow this season to escape such a designation, the same cannot be said for areas in the northern Rocky Mountains and Washington State, according to an update issued Wednesday. In those areas, which are enduring “the most severe snow drought,” snowpack at many lower elevations has melted one to four weeks early, per the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Integrated...

As of Monday, California’s snow water equivalent is 199% of normal for this date (January 9), according to the California Department of Water Resources. The Southern Sierra is 222% of normal. The Central Sierra is 201% while the Northern Sierra/Trinity is 173%. The snowpack outlook is also promising along the crucial Colorado River basins which feed Lake Powell and Lake Mead and is Southern California’s primary source of drinking water. Snow water equivalent in the Rockies generally range from 117% to 176% of normal.

Climate Change: As a Colorado Rockies playoff game is snowed out, scientists report that Arctic sea ice is thickening and Antarctic snow melt is the lowest in three decades. Whatever happened to global warming? Al Gore wasn't there to throw out the first snowball, er, baseball, so he might not have noticed that Saturday's playoff game between the Colorado Rockies and the Philadelphia Phillies was snowed out - in early October. The field should have been snow-free just as the North Pole was to be ice-free this year. It seems that ice at both poles hasn't been paying attention to...

Climate Change: As a Colorado Rockies playoff game is snowed out, scientists report that Arctic sea ice is thickening and Antarctic snow melt is the lowest in three decades. Whatever happened to global warming? Al Gore wasn't there to throw out the first snowball, er, baseball, so he might not have noticed that Saturday's playoff game between the Colorado Rockies and the Philadelphia Phillies was snowed out — in early October. The field should have been snow-free just as the North Pole was to be ice-free this year. It seems that ice at both poles hasn't been paying attention to...

Warmer climes have led to more rain and less snow falling in the Western U.S., a shift that could increase the risk of flooding and affect water supplies, according to a study by the U.S. Geological Survey. Researchers found that warmer weather in the last half century has led to an average decline in snowfall of about 20% in the 11 Western mountain states -- much of it falling instead in the form of rain. During that period, the average temperature in the region has risen by about one degree Celsius. Two years ago, a separate group of scientists at...