Sierra snowpack: 52% of average, water content at 49%

The water content in the Sierra snowpack was measured in Phillips April 2, 2018 and it is at 49 percent of the April 1 average.

The California Department of Water Resources snow survey team did their final physical measurement of the year at their normal location in Phillips at the intersection of Highway 50 and Sierra-at-Tahoe Road, west of Lake Tahoe.

Depth of the snow was measured at 32.1 inches and it contained 12.4 inches of water which is 49 percent of long term average for April 1 at the location.

The snowpack measured in at 52 percent of average.

"It's not nearly where we'd like it to be," said Frank Gehrke, chief of the California Cooperative Snow Surveys Program. "March was not adequate to get us up to a really good outlook in respect to the water supply."

He did say March was "respectable" and added 11 inches of water content to the snowpack, but nothing like Miracle March of 1991 when the snowpack went from 17 percent of average to 73 percent of average in just 29 days, and the water content gained 26 inches.

"We're living off our savings of last year," added Gerhke who said we must continue to conserve water. In 2017, the snowpack measurement on April 1 was 190 percent of average and "water rich."

This is a big improvement over the previous 2018 measurements. January's water content was at 3 percent of average, February measured 14 percent of average, and March was at 39 percent of average.

Gehrke said last year's big snow will lessen the impacts on California's reservoirs which are fuller than normal, so the moderate to mediocre snowpack measurements today won't be be as much of an impact as in prior drought years.