Six more weeks of Summer

Put up the skis and break out the swim trunks and sun screen.  Two more days of near record or record high temperatures across the Sierra before a weak system moves in from the south and brings some light precipitation over the area.

-Above normal temperatures continue for the foreseeable future
-A weak system will bring some light snow to the high elevations on Tuesday
-Possible storm for the Southern Sierra at the end of the work week

This system will do little more than drop the temperatures and bring a couple of inches of new snow to the higher elevations.  Models have trended a bit wetter as can be seen in Figure 1.  Hopefully the trend continues and this system exceeds expectations.

Figure 1: Comparison between the 00z GFS (on the left) and the 18Z GFS (on the right) for accumulated precipitation from now through Thursday at noon 

Another storm is forecasted to impact the Southern Sierra on Friday but confidence is low this far out, especially this winter...

Unfortunately, there isn't much relief in sight for the drought or for the dwindling snow pack. The Climate Prediction Center (CPC) has above average temperatures and below average precipitation for the next 6-10 and 8-14 days (see Figure 2).  For our sake, let's hope the CPC is misguided and their forecasts are a bust.

Figure 2: Climate Prediction Center's 6-10 day temperature (upper left) and precipitation (upper right) forecast and their 8-14 day temperature (lower left) and precipitation (lower right) forecast

Looks like the Omegasaurus is here to stay for the foreseeable future...