Wash state snowpack back to normal

A cold, wet March has pushed Washington's mountain snowpack to about normal, but some pockets of the state still face lower than average stream flows this summer.

Overall, the measurements show snowpack averaged 99 percent of normal statewide, but conditions differ dramatically from basin to basin.

As a result, summer stream flow forecasts vary from 125 percent of average on the Cedar and Rex rivers, in the central Cascades just east of Seattle, to 59 percent of average on north-central Washington's Okanogan River, according to April 1 measurements taken by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service.

"The repeated ebb and flow of this year's snowpack conditions have kept us all wondering if we'd end the year above average, below average, or average. As it turns out, we got all three," said Scott Pattee, water supply specialist.

Winter storms generated in the South Pacific bounced off the Olympic Peninsula, pummeling the central and southern Cascades through Oregon, Pattee said. Some monitoring stations at lower elevations, about 2,000 feet, are over 2,000 percent of average on the west side of the central Cascades.

But a high-pressure weather system that settled over Washington's northern tier prevented those areas from receiving heavy winter snow, he said.

"What snow we received in the Skagit and in the northern tier was fringe snow," Pattee said. "The southern Canadian regions are in no better shape than the northern tier. The water we share back and forth across the Canadian border will be affected."

The conservation service measures the depth and water content of snow at more than 100 locations around the state. That data is used to estimate how much water will flow down rivers and streams and into reservoirs as the snow melts.

A shortage of water has been a regular problem in recent summers and is likely to continue in north-central Washington this year, raising concerns about summer wildfires.

The forecast for stream flows there falls below 75 percent of average, which is generally the trigger for declaring a drought. However, Pattee said local officials don't believe they will have that severe of a low-water year.

"It's going to come down to how cool the spring is, how much growth they get, how fast the snow comes off," he said.

May is forecast to be cooler than usual, but forecasters so far have been unable to pinpoint potential precipitation for that month.

Water supplies from the Dungeness River on the Olympic Peninsula also are a concern. The stream flow forecast there is 79 percent of average.

In central Washington, the Yakima River is forecast at 88 percent of average, and farmers are anticipating a full supply of water for their irrigated crops.

The Spokane River is forecast at 100 percent of average, while stream flows in the Blue Mountains in southeast Washington are forecast at 109 percent of average.