Click on a thumbnail to view the gallery of snowpack data from the NRCS.
From Steamboat Today (Tom Ross):
David Baldinger Jr., the official observer for the National Weather Service, said his weather station not far from Steamboat Springs High School finished March with 16.1 inches of snow and14.7 on the ground, compared to 28.5 inches accumulation and 20.8 on the ground at the end of March 2013.
Baldinger Jr. confirmed that consistent snowfall has been the hallmark of the weather pattern the past two months — February began with snowfall in town on 14 of the first 17 days…
Monday’s measured snowfall of 6 inches at midmountain and 7 inches at the summit marked the biggest 24-hour snowfall of the month. Steamboat finished up with 13 inches of midmountain snow and 17 at the summit in the final five days of the month.
For the season, Steamboat now has seen 333 inches of snowfall and is within a couple of inches of the 20-year average with the ski season scheduled to end April 13…
The amount of moisture contained in the snowpack at several key measuring sites in the mountains above Steamboat Springs already is greater than the median peak for the season, according to records kept by the National Resources Conservation Service…
A snowpack measuring site at 9,400 feet on the west summit of Rabbit Ears Pass that is maintained by the NRCS shows 35.3 inches of water is contained in the snow there. That’s 145 percent of the median for the date, but also 135 percent of the median peak, which isn’t statistically due for another four weeks April 28.
The median peak water stored at the end of the winter on Rabbit Ears is 26.1 inches compared to 35.3 inches there now…
The Tower site, at 10,500 feet elevation on Buffalo Pass, just northeast of the city of Steamboat, is storing significantly more water than Rabbit Ears right now — 51.3 inches — and the median date when it peaks isn’t until May 9. As of March 31, the snowpack at the Continental Divide is 147 inches deep and 118 percent of median for the date. Coincidentally, that is 100 percent of the median.
Steamboat typically sees two phases of spring runoff, the first when lower elevation boosts river flows, and the second much later when the snow above 9,000 feet finally gives in to the longer, warmer days of spring.