Annual 'Let's look at the Lake Powell Snowpack' thread

[sandm]

Don't worry Tall, California will help ya out

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/15/wate...iver-plan.html

[talltigeguy]

Here we go again: April 15 is generally regarded as the date of maximum snowpack for the Colorado River which feeds Lake Powell.

Current snowpack is at 99% of normal. Dead average when compared to historical snowpack at this time of year. That will still translate to a pretty good runoff, but there are still some variables in play. Lake Powell is at 3600 feet, about 100 feet before the top of the dam and at the second highest level it has been at this time of year in the last 6 years.

Interestingly, the winter was very good for Lake Mead and it has risen 13 feet or so. It is at the highest level in 6 years by a pretty good margin. It is still very low compared to historical norms, but this winter turned out to be a pretty good year for the Colorado River Basin.

All of this information can be found here: http://lakepowell.water-data.com/

What information I am not good at finding is if they plan on letting most of the runoff down to Lake Mead or keep it in Lake Powell. Water managers have likely buried that information somewhere on the BLM website and if anyone can find it, it would be nice to know.

It sure would be great if they would let Powell rise enough to make the Castle Rock cutoff a wide freeway instead of a long channel. I hate driving my houseboat through there, especially when an idiot with a Mastercraft tied to the SIDE of the houseboat comes through the other direction. He just made his 16 foot wide houseboat into a 24 foot wide behemoth houseboat. For those that have not been there, the cut is a man made cut in the sandstone bottom about 40 feet wide and several hundred yards long. It cuts 10+ miles off of the trip to get further up the lake. 10 miles can be a long ways in a houseboat.

[sandm]

seen quite a bit on this over the last 6 months and looks like a bunch of mead's increase is due to some voluntary cutbacks last summer AND there's some mandatory things coming this year. this article pretty much sums it up.
if I was a betting man I would THINK that any savings in water will end up in mead not powell as seems most of the water users look to mead as the litmus for how the colorado water supply is doing and the agreements on where to leave 'extra' water point to mead not powell.
If I were in the drivers seat, would think powell would be the better place to let it sit as it's not as hot from an evaporation standpoint and keeps the water further upstream to benefit all users not just those in mead but politics will prevail.

https://www.azcentral.com/story/news...te/4359571002/

[UNSTUCK]

Thought I heard or read that Powell looses more water to the sandstone rock than to evaporation and that Mead actually has much less loss in those respects.

Either way, we still have snow in the forecast so it’s not done yet. Sure hope the lakes will be open soon.

[sandm]

Thought I heard or read that Powell looses more water to the sandstone rock than to evaporation and that Mead actually has much less loss in those respects.

interesting and makes complete sense...

[talltigeguy]

Thought I heard or read that Powell looses more water to the sandstone rock than to evaporation and that Mead actually has much less loss in those respects.

Either way, we still have snow in the forecast so it’s not done yet. Sure hope the lakes will be open soon.

I understand that too, Powell's water ends up in the aquifer. Recent arguments are to store the most water we can in Mead. Because of the recreation, they do keep Powell at a certain level, I think.

[boonecragun]

Morons going through the cut.....boils my blood. Most of the time they know better, they just like being jack @$$e$...why would he tie his MC to the side of the houseboat?? Brilliant.

[boonecragun]

Runoff is hitting Powell!

[boonecragun]

Is runoff tapering off. Mild year if so....

[freeheel4life]

So, I'm the ski nerd(and boat nerd). Even with the Covid Abasin closed almost a month earlier than it did last year due to lack of snow. Have also skied there for some late season parties at "the beach". Id say snowpack in t hat area of the rockies was average but not Phenomenal. Good years are skiing on the 4th of July

[talltigeguy]

The runoff did not give us as much as I expected. Some of it was down to Mead this winter, but I think the snow stopped in April and we lost some of our snowpack. I was there last week and the water level was flat all week long. It still went up 10 feet, but is another 10 feet below the peak of last year.

[sandm]

here we go in a new year. curious to see what Tall predicts this year. hearing it's going to be a tough year for water.

[talltigeguy]

here we go in a new year. curious to see what Tall predicts this year. hearing it's going to be a tough year for water.

Ugggh. Lake Powell is 27 feet down compared to where it was 1 year ago today. Snowpack is at 74% of normal. Those are abysmal numbers. It isn't like they have sent it all to Mead, since Mead is down 7 feet compared to last year, which is quite a bit for Mead.

Good news is that heavy pounding of snow in February can reverse much of it, but the longer we go without snow, the harder it is to catch up. An average snow year from here on out still isn't adequate. The max snowpack is reached in mid April, so there is still time, but it is a bad sign that the lake is already much lower than last year and so far the snowpack is not looking favorable at all.

I guess it might be nice that all of the mussels should be 50 feet out of the water.

[sandm]

I guess it might be nice that all of the mussels should be 50 feet out of the water.

silver lining guy... haha....

I used to watch the levels pretty close when I was in boise with lucky peak but haven't dug into mead and where to find. know it's out there but mead has a whole lot of factors that go into it and although i've read up on them, def. not an expert nor without a history, how bad it might or might not be.

thx for the update and look forward to posts in here to see what's in store.

[freeheel4life]

I'm doing my ski thing instead of boats this winter and we are below average here as well.

Haven't looked at Rockies snowpack, but I think the only winners right now are Jackson Hole/Targhee and the Cascades.