Snow helps, but drought outlook uncertain
Weather patterns are not yielding clues to season
By DAN ELLIOTT
Associated Press
DENVER – The outlook for a major change in Colorado’s drought is uncertain even though holiday storms have improved the mountain snowpack, a climate researcher said Thursday.
“It’s not quite good enough to pull us out of the drought, but at least (it’s) bringing temporary relief and optimism,” State Climatologist Nolan Doesken said.
Snow levels were as low as 40 percent of average earlier this month in the state’s eight major river basins.
On Thursday, the levels ranged from a low of 63 percent of average in the Arkansas River Basin to 85 percent in the Yampa and White river basins.
“While those numbers aren’t great, they’re a big improvement over 2½ weeks ago,” Doesken said. ...
Doesken said the forecast for the first part of 2013 doesn’t include much moisture, and the longer-range outlook is uncertain.
Conditions in the Pacific Ocean determine some long-distance weather patterns, which in turn affect snowfall in the West. So far, the Pacific has yielded few clues about those patterns, Doesken said.
“It doesn’t bode snowy, it doesn’t bode drought. It doesn’t bode average, either. It just bodes ‘We don’t know,’” he said.
The U.S. Drought Monitor shows Colorado conditions ranging from moderate – the middle of the five-step scale – to exceptional drought, the worst end of the scale.
