The 237" of snow recorded by the Tahoe snow lab (elevation 7000’) this month is 35% more than any previously recorded January. The previous record of 175" came in the winter of 1981-82.
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| https://files.opensnow.com/Tahoe/2017/january4/Jan_Snows.JPG |
Jan 2017 became not just the deepest January but also the snowiest month ever recorded in Tahoe... again not by an inch or two but by a massive variance of 36" (beating 201" from March of 1992).
Contrast 237" with the total of 1" from January 2015. I believe going from record drought to record snowfall in 2 years is explained only by human-induced climate change. Either that or the law of averages is simply playing out, but such extreme deviations from norm is anything but average, and is unseen in previous years. There were no significant global weather events to have caused this, such as a volcano eruption. I am not a meteorologist, oceanographer, or a systems ecologist, but I would guess this extreme variation is due to the unusual change in oceanic temperatures that man has caused (which affects the jet stream and moisture flows, etc.) Given even very minor changes in ocean temperatures are causing increasingly frequent extreme weather (it only takes a cooling of .5 degree Celsius - 1 degree Fahrenheit - to be considered a La Niña winter), we should be cautious to not cause greater deviation from norms.
Contrast 237" with the total of 1" from January 2015. I believe going from record drought to record snowfall in 2 years is explained only by human-induced climate change. Either that or the law of averages is simply playing out, but such extreme deviations from norm is anything but average, and is unseen in previous years. There were no significant global weather events to have caused this, such as a volcano eruption. I am not a meteorologist, oceanographer, or a systems ecologist, but I would guess this extreme variation is due to the unusual change in oceanic temperatures that man has caused (which affects the jet stream and moisture flows, etc.) Given even very minor changes in ocean temperatures are causing increasingly frequent extreme weather (it only takes a cooling of .5 degree Celsius - 1 degree Fahrenheit - to be considered a La Niña winter), we should be cautious to not cause greater deviation from norms.
While many people are excited about what a great ski season this has been already, including myself, I still believe it is cause for concern. The collective population, or the current government at the very least, seems to think that tinkering with or mutating systems ecology as if nature were a roulette wheel is not dangerous. I think otherwise.
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