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Water Year 2022 Recap

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Water Year 2022 Recap

Superlatively average

Jonathan P. Thompson
Oct 4, 2022
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Water Year 2022 Recap

www.landdesk.org
A precipitation rollercoaster across much of the West helped soothe drought conditions in most of the region, especially the Interior. California, however, remains dry. National Drought Monitor.

Happy New Water Year! The first day of October is also when folks restart their precipitation and snowpack meters and river gages. It is a time of hope (please give us more snow this time!) and reflection (last year was bonkers!). I’m going to stick with the reflection here.

The 2022 Water Year, which ended Sept. 30, was quite the rollercoaster ride. It started out looking grim in much of the West: Many ski areas weren’t able to hit their traditional Thanksgiving weekend opening and in some areas the end of November snowpack was in worse shape even than in 2002, the winter of everyone’s discontent.

Then came the December dumps, at least to some regions. California’s Sierras got hammered by record-breaking snowfall (193 inches in December). Southwestern Colorado went from parched to chest-deep-powder in a matter of weeks. Heavy traffic to ski areas snarled roadways.

To be sure, the bounty was spread out unevenly. Even as Front Range ski resorts were getting hammered, the Denver-Boulder metro area remained dry, warm, and windy as hell. The flammable combination ultimately led to the devastating Marshall Fire, which was sparked in the grasslands near South Boulder before tearing through suburbia and destroying more than 1,000 homes. It was finally extinguished by the season’s first real snowfall on New Year’s Eve.

The rollercoaster ride continued after that, with long, dry cold spells followed by big storms followed by unusually warm periods. Dry and wet offset each other in many areas, with snowpack peaking early, but at just-below to near-average levels across much of the West.

Alaska and the Northwest had average to above-average winters in terms of snowfall, but the rest of the West ended up below average, again. Still, 2022 was far healthier than 2021 in just about every area except for New Mexico. This is the level as of May 1; peak snowpack used to come later in almost every region, but lately it is more likely to occur in April in most areas. Source: SNOTEL.

Summer followed in kind as hot and dry alternated with gully-busting storms. And despite all the flooding, monsoon precipitation amounts were about average in the Southwest.

And that kind of sums up Water Year 2022: It was full of superlatives, yet ended up more or less average, precipitation-wise. But in these days of aridification and warming temperatures, and following on the heels of two decades of drought, average just doesn’t cut it.

Water Year precipitation from Oct. 1 through Sept. 30. After a slim winter an abundant monsoon helped most areas’ precipitation levels recover.

Despite near-average precipitation levels in the Colorado Basin, Lake Powell continued its steady decline, finishing the water year about 16 feet lower than the end of Water Year 2021.

To summarize: It was a year of more or less average precipitation and above average temperatures. While drought eased in some areas, aridification continues just about everywhere.

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Water Year 2022 Recap

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