Twain Harte Lumber employee Brent Mackenzie plows snow in front of the store on Twain Harte Drive Monday morning. Amy Alonzo Rozak/Union Democrat, copyright 2012
Another storm system is expected to reach the region tonight, according to National Weather Service meteorologists in Sacramento.
Rain is forecast overnight and into Wednesday, giving way to clear skies through Saturday. There is a slight chance of rain Saturday night through Monday.
The weekend storm system that dumped rain and snow on the Mother Lode Sunday night and Monday came in from the Gulf of Alaska and brought nearly three-fifths of an inch of rain to Sonora and 14 inches of snow to Dodge Ridge ski area in Pinecrest on Sunday.
Monday’s showers brought 0.32 inch of rain to Sonora, 0.49 inch in Angels Camp and nearly three inches of snow in Cedar Ridge.
Bear Valley Ski Resort also saw nine inches of snow over the weekend with several additional inches Monday, according to its snow report.
The storms were a welcome respite for the particularly dry winter thus far, though the area’s precipitation is still at less than half of the 2011 storm levels.
For the weather year that started July 1, Sonora has seen 9.03 inches of rain and 11.29 inches in Angels Camp.
By this time last year, Sonora had collected 26.87 inches of precipitation and Dodge Ridge had accumulated 24 feet of snow.
Communities in the higher elevations, like Cedar Ridge and Twain Harte, have tallied more than 14 inches of rain and snow this rain season, compared to more than 35 inches at this time last year.
Water officials are eyeing precipitation closely, and water providers, like Tuolumne Utilities District, are considering implementing water-conservation efforts in case the rest of winter and spring is as equally dry.
“It’s looking pretty dry. It’s not the driest year but it’s not a whole lot better,” said Maury Roos, National Weather Service hydrologist. “It’s highly unlikely we’ll get enough to have a normal (snow) pack.”
The annual snowpack survey conducted during the first week of January found the statewide water content is 19 percent of normal at this time of year.
It was only 7 percent of the average April 1 measurement, when snowpack is normally at its peak before the spring melt, according to the DWR snow survey.
Thanks to last year’s heavy storms, Lake Oroville, the State Water Project’s principal storage reservoir, with a capacity of 3.5 million acre feet, is 72 percent full. That’s 104 percent of average for the time of year, the DWR said.
Mountain snow that melts into reservoirs, streams and aquifers in the spring and summer provides approximately one-third of the water for California’s households, farms and industries, the DWR reports.
The DWR will conduct another snowpack survey Feb. 29, Roos said.
He said despite the weekend storms, the Central Sierra snowpack was one-third of average Monday.
This week’s storms will be helpful, but “maybe we’ll get one inch if we’re lucky,” in the Central Sierra, he said.
So far, snowpack levels were 28 percent of average for Monday’s date and 21 percent of the total average April 1 amount, he said.
“We need about 29 inches for a full pack and we’ve got six in the bag and probably about not even one-third of a season to go,” Roos explained, adding that we need “quite a storm.”
“We need about 20 to 21 more inches of water content,” or about 5 feet of snow, by the April 1 snow survey, Roos said.
The good news for Californians is there is a slight, 10 percent above average, surplus of water in the state’s reservoirs from last year, Roos said.
The next storm system is expected to come from the Gulf of Alaska on Saturday into Sunday, with the snow level down to 2,500 feet, said National Weather Service meteorologist Holly Osborne.
The Sonora-area is expected to get an additional one-quarter inch of rain this week, she said.
Temperatures are expected to be in the mid- to high 50s and lows are expected to dip as low as 31 Wednesday night.
