{"id":206484,"date":"2026-03-06T01:11:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-06T01:11:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/206484\/"},"modified":"2026-03-06T01:11:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T01:11:09","slug":"satellite-photos-show-californias-sudden-snowpack-meltdown-now-you-see-it-now-you-dont","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/206484\/","title":{"rendered":"Satellite photos show California’s sudden snowpack meltdown: Now you see it, now you don’t"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Just weeks after major storms brought snow to the Sierra Nevada<\/a>, a winter heat wave has all but eliminated California\u2019s snowpack gains.<\/p>\n

Satellite photos from NASA show the extent of the major melting event, which took place in late February and early March.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe extremely rapid loss of the snow that fell during the late Feb storm cycle, which in many cases dropped multiple feet of snow in the Sierra Nevada over just a couple of days, is genuinely remarkable,\u201d Daniel Swain, a climate scientist with UC Agriculture and Natural Resources, said in an email to The Times.<\/p>\n

The image below shows the Sierra from space on Feb. 22, at left, and then on March 3.<\/p>\n

In less than 10 days, the snow receded significantly amid a heat wave that sent temperatures 15 to 20 degrees above normal<\/a> in much of the state. <\/p>\n

As forecasters expect above-average temperatures for the next several weeks, Swain said, snowpack losses are likely to continue.<\/p>\n

California relies on the Sierra snowpack<\/a> for about 30% of its water.<\/p>\n

But extreme warmth across the West this winter has meant more precipitation falling as rain, not snow \u2014 a symptom of global warming, experts say, which in recent years has been pushing average snow lines higher in the mountains and changing the timing of runoff.<\/p>\n

There are 130 monitoring stations across the Sierra Nevada that provide electronic readings of the snowpack. The northern Sierra is currently at 38% of average and the southern Sierra 83% of average. In the image above from Feb. 22, the southern Sierra was at 98% of normal.<\/p>\n

The image below shows the Sierra on Feb. 12, left, and again on March 3.<\/p>\n

The heavy snow that blanketed the mountains in between the photos was barely noticeable, as snow levels had retreated back to early-February levels.<\/p>\n

Swain noted that there is still significant moisture in California\u2019s mountains, but the diminished snowpack will likely affect the state\u2019s water supply and wildfire risk later this summer.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe very early loss of snowpack will effectively make the long, dry summer that much longer in the mountains,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Times staff writer Ian James contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Just weeks after major storms brought snow to the Sierra Nevada, a winter heat wave has all but…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":206485,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[4937,7,54228,95286,45043,8568,48,52,51,47,50,49,66,8571,88503,271,95285,21733,95287,36898,646],"class_list":["post-206484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-average","tag-california","tag-daniel-swain","tag-early-march","tag-feb","tag-image","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-mountain","tag-satellite-photo","tag-sierra-nevada-mountain","tag-snow","tag-snowpack-loss","tag-southern-sierra","tag-sudden-snowpack-meltdown","tag-temperature","tag-water"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206484","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206484"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206484\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/206485"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}