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SCIENCEFriday 5 January 2018
California: Hardly any snow but not in drought again, yet
PHILLIPS STATION, Calif. Bret McTigue, left, and his daughter Taylor, 8, head to the slopes at Sierra-at-Tahoe Ski Resort, As Californians, “we live in
(AP) — The grassy brown Wednesday, Jan. 3, 2018, near Echo Summit, Calif. the most variable climate
Sierra meadow where Cali- in the country,” Davis said
fornia’s water managers Associated Press Wednesday, surrounded
gave the results of the win- by forecasters and water
ter’s first manual snowpack snowpack measurements Weather Service said this bare of snow to declare officials in parkas for their
measurements Wednes- in these mountains crucial week was marking its driest a drought emergency, in- mountain-meadow news
day told the story — the gauges of how much wa- 10-month period on record. cluding mandatory wa- conference. “That variabil-
drought-prone state is off ter cities and farms will get Residents there last saw sig- ter cutbacks by cities and ity is what we have to man-
to another unusually dry in the year ahead. nificant rainfall in February. towns. age.”
start in its vital winter rain This winter, one month into The dry start to the rain Near-record rainfall last He called for more im-
and snow season. the state’s peak storm sea- and snow season is rais- winter snapped the historic provements in long-range
“We would like to have son, snowpack across the ing worries the state could drought, filling reservoirs forecasting, to help the
had more snow,” Grant Sierras stood Wednesday be plunging right back and sending many rivers state’s reservoir managers
Davis, head of California’s at 24 percent of normal. into drought. The scene over their banks. Reservoirs better operate dams for
Department of Water Re- The dry spell is even more Wednesday was remiscent remain at 110 percent of both water supplies and
sources, told news crews acute in Southern Cali- of 2015, when Gov. Jerry normal storage thanks to flood control.
gathered in this mountain fornia, including Los An- Brown stood in a brown, the last wet winter, water As the climate changes,
field, bare of all but a few geles, which the National dry Sierra meadow equally officials said. much of the state’s water
crusty dots of old snow. is coming in the form of
“It’s early,” Davis said. rain during storms known as
“We’re obviously hopeful “atmospheric rivers,” Davis
there will be more snow noted.
the next time we come out “It’s very clear to us that we
here.” need to have more infor-
He spoke after Frank Geh- mation” about how atmo-
rke, head of the state’s spheric rivers behave over-
snow survey team, stuck a all, Davis said.
metal pole into one of the This winter, in contrast to
few patches of snow at the the previous rain-sodden
site, measuring just over an one, meteorologists point
inch (2.5 centimeters), or 3 to a strengthening La Nina
percent of normal. weather pattern in the Pa-
Climate change increas- cific, which typically brings
ingly is changing the moun- drier weather.
tain snowfall equation, but A stubborn ridge of high
historically up to 60 percent pressure in the Pacific —
of Californians’ water sup- the same bad guy during
ply each year starts out as the state’s drought — has
snowfall in the Sierras. been blocking storms from
That makes the state’s reaching Southern Califor-
manual and electronic nia in particular.q
Real weather term “bomb”
blows up on social media
A person walks in the snow on King Street in Charleston, S.C., strict definition, said Uni- going to be a bomb at all,” do and others said. The
Wednesday, Jan. 3, 2018. versity of Oklahoma me- Maue said. “There’s noth- worst of this storm will stay
teorology professor Jason ing exploding or detonat- out to sea. What is going to
Associated Press Furtado. ing.” be bigger is the high winds
After it showed it showed Storm intensity is measured — gusts exceeding 60 mph
By SETH BORENSTEIN Wednesday off the U.S. up in a Washington Post by central pressure — the — and the bitter cold that
AP Science Writer Southeast coast. But as story on Tuesday, the lower the pressure, the follows, they said.
WASHINGTON (AP) — fearsome as the storm is weather geek term took stronger. Bomb cyclones draw air
When it comes to weather, with high winds and some on a life of its own on so- A storm is considered a from polar regions after
it’s hard to sound scarier snow, it may not be quite cial media. The same thing “bomb” when the pressure they leave. In this case, it
than “bomb cyclone.” as explosive as the term happened four years ago drops rapidly — at least 24 means extra cold Arctic air
It’s a version of a real sounds. with “polar vortex,” anoth- millibars in 24 hours. because of where the po-
weather term that ap- Meteorologists have used er long-used weather term This storm looks like it will lar vortex is, Furtado said.
plies to a massive winter the term “bomb” for storms that was little known to the intensify at twice that rate, Worldwide, about 40 to
storm that pulled together for decades, based on a public until then. said Bob Oravec, lead 50 “bomb cyclones” brew
“Bombogenesis is the tech- forecaster at the National each year, but most are
nical term. Bomb cyclone Weather Service’s Weath- over open ocean and no-
is a shortened version of it, er Prediction Center. body but weather geeks
better for social media,” So far, the storm has notice, Maue said.
said Weather.US meteo- dumped freak snow on the “We use the term bomb,”
rologist Ryan Maue, who Southeast. It’s aiming for Furtado said.
helped popularize polar the Northeast, where the “We know what it means,
vortex in 2014. snow forecast for Thursday but I do think it gets a little
“The actual impacts aren’t isn’t that big a deal, Furta- hyped up.”q
