Doesn’t this seem like the longest summer ever? Since Alpine Meadows closed so early last spring, we are looking at about a 230 day stretch until our favorite mountain opens again for sliding on snow. Typically that number is closer to 180 days. But as of now, we are just crossing the half way mark and thoughts are turning toward next season. I’ve bought one pair of skis and two sets of bindings already. Both Moment and J Skis release their new offerings on August 1st and I have money stashed to cover the latest and greatest. Whatever you do, don’t remind us that Alpine Meadows opened a month late last season!
Everybody Is Saying It
The overly popular ski blogs have already jumped on the El Niño bandwagon. They always do. The memory of just a couple of big El Niño snow seasons enters people’s minds and suddenly the hype begins again. I have mentioned before that snow sells. Our readership peaks when there is more snow and hence more skiers willing to drop dollars at ski areas and the surrounding communities. Selling a big ski season ahead of winter increases excitement, increases readership and increases ad sales. While I like excitement and more readers, we don’t do ad sales – so we don’t need to hype a potentially super duper biggest ever monster El Niño.
What Is El Niño?
The term “El Niño” refers to a pool of warmer than normal water found in the equatorial region of the Pacific ocean. That warm pool of heat energy affects ocean currents, which in turn affects atmospheric currents that we normally call the jet stream. The Pacific jet stream is the primary driving force that brings storms to California and the Tahoe region.
Theoretically in an El Niño pattern, you get a strong southern jet stream that drives storms more southerly than normal. You would think that means we get colder storms in Tahoe. Generally speaking that is not the case. El Niño years are typically warmer.
Below are the most up to date seasonal outlooks from NOAA for December – January – February. We’ve been trying to teach you that those months are “meteorological winter”.
Geez. when you look at it that way that does not look so promising! Just a reminder, these NOAA outlooks merely show the probability of something happening. They do not show the degree of variation. So the darker brown in the Pacific Northwest just means “more likely to be warm” rather than “it’s gonna be hot, hot, hot.”
The opposite of El Niño is a La Niña, which is defined by a colder than normal pool of water in the equatorial region of the Pacific.
Well that does not look so great either! The jet stream drives storms to the north, often leaving us on the warm side of the jet stream. But truth be told, some of our biggest winters in Tahoe have been during La Niña years. Keep reading, as I have the actual stats for Alpine Meadows later in this post.
It’s Complicated!
People want to keep thing simple as in “El Niño will save us!” It’s just not that simple at all. Here’s just a few different things to consider:
• The El Niño pattern generally develops in the spring and peaks as we go into autumn. In many years, it’s actually subsiding during the winter months. In some years, the phenomenon does continue throughout winter. This may be one of those winters.
• According to the biggest of the big weather gurus, Daniel Swain PhD, only the strongest El Niños have a true impact on California weather. Swain did an extended discussion on this subject in one of his “Office Hours” question and answer sessions on Youtube in May. Weather nerds and wanna be nerds may enjoy that discussion here. Currently temperatures at the International Dateline near the equator are around 1.5°C warmer than normal and that number will likely climb into record territory by autumn. They are even warmer off the southern California coast and Baja, resulting in repeated monsoonal flows this summer, leading to more thunderstorms.
• El Niño and La Niña are just one “teleconnection” that potentially affect weather in far off places. There are other examples. One we often talk about here is the Madden Julian Oscillation, or MJO, which is centered around the Indian Ocean, Australia and Central Pacific – yet it still can affect our weather here. The weak MJO the last two seasons gets some blame for two weaker winters. The Atlantic Oscillation, Or AO, is another teleconnection. Colder than average water there could mean more eastern ridging next winter, keeping storms focused in the west. It could happen.
• The biggest effects of El Niño occur in the Southern California and region. Odds are good that a super El Niño event next winter will bring a lot of winter wetness to that region. While this sounds great, it is not necessarily ideal. Much of the water storage capacity that serves Southern California is outside of the region. There is not enough water storage in the area to support current needs. Expect an increase of weather related problems: flooding, mudslides, coastal erosion will be the big stories this winter.
• The big winner during El Niño winters is usually Mammoth Mountain. It’s far enough south of Tahoe to benefit from a southerly jet stream. Combine that with a ridiculously high elevation to combat higher snow levels and that is a win. El Niño winters at Mammoth often leave a snowpack that allows operations deep into the summer. The upcoming supersized El Niño could be the thing that allows Mammoth to continuously operate through the summer into the next ski season. It’s the dream of every ski bum like myself.
Let’s Dive Into The Historical Data From Alpine Meadows
Let’s be clear here. Looking at historical weather data seems like a good starting point to figure out what will happen in the future, right? Wrong. It only helps us see what could happen. It’s no guarantee of what will happen in the future. We have mentioned frequently that the idea of an average winter is not what you think. Snowfall at the official measuring plot near the bottom of the mountain has varied from 132 inches in a season to a high of 662 inches in a season. In between, those numbers are all over the place. Our current “average” of 360 inches is based on widely scattered data points.
First let’s compare seasonal snowfall for all El Niño seasons that fall into the “strong” or “very strong” category:
| °C Variation | Snowfall Average 360″ | Rainfall Average 56″ | % of Ave Snowfall | ||
| 1972-1973 | 1.4 | Strong El Niño | 335″ | 39″ | 93% |
| 1982-1982 | 2.1 | Very Strong El Niño | 598″ | 78″ | 139% |
| 1987-1988 | 1.6 | Strong El Niño | 216″ | 32″ | 60% |
| 1991-1992 | 1.4 | Strong El Niño | 206″ | 30″ | 57% |
| 1992-1993 | 1.7 | Strong El Niño | 501″ | 70″ | 139% |
| 1997-1998 | 2.3 | Very Strong El Niño | 532″ | 75″ | 148% |
| 2015-2016 | 2.4 | Very Strong El Niño | 357″ | 65″ | 99% |
| 2023-2024 | 1.7 | Strong El Niño | 298″ | 51″ | 83% |
Yup, the numbers are pretty much all over the place. The only key takeaway to note is that the stronger El Niño years do see more rainfall, but not necessarily more snowfall. The thing to take into account is that Alpine Meadows official snowfall is tallied at the base area near Roundhouse. Theoretically snowfall amounts could have been greater at the upper snow study plot at the top of The Sisters. The upper plot is not the official plot, as access to that site isn’t always available during big storms. The marketing department will use the upper plot numbers, when they are available, to create storm hype.
The chart below is similar, but instead of looking just at El Niño years, it looks at all of the bigger snowfall years. I limited myself to years where the snowfall at the base exceeded 125% of average, which means over 450″. It’s revealing.
| 1994-1995 | 662″ | 184% | 0.8°C | Weak El Niño |
| 2010-2011 | 616″ | 171% | -1.4°C | Strong La Niña |
| 2022-2023 | 607″ | 169% | -1.1°C | Moderate La Niña |
| 1982-1983 | 598″ | 166% | 2.1°C | Very Strong El Niño |
| 1981-1982 | 569″ | 158% | -0.1°C | Neutral |
| 2016-2017 | 552″ | 153% | -0.7°C | Weak La Niña |
| 2018-2019 | 536″ | 149% | 0.5°C | Weak El Niño |
| 1997-1998 | 532″ | 148% | 2.3°C | Very Strong El Niño |
| 1998-1999 | 515″ | 143% | -1.5° | Strong La Niña |
| 1992-1993 | 501″ | 139% | 1.7°C | Strong El Niño |
| 2005-2006 | 494″ | 137% | -0.1°C | Neutral |
Those two tables pretty much suggest that there is really not much correlation between big snow years and El Niño conditions in the Pacific Ocean. It’s certainly not a great enough correlation to go out and buy the fattest powder skis you can find, nor should you double down on your short term rental reservations or ski leases for next season. The only place where more snow is almost a sure bet for next season is at Mammoth Mountain. For Alpine Meadows and the rest of of the Tahoe ski areas, it’s probably better to look at the seasonal forecasts as we get closer to winter.
Why Is There So Much Variability?
In California and the Sierra Nevada, the big snow producers are atmospheric river events. Bigger snow years have more AR events, stronger AR events and a good blend of AR moisture with cold arctic air from the Gulf of Alaska. While El Niño years generally do increase the number of AR events, the placement of the jet stream is critical.
Looking at the graphic of an atmospheric river event in 2025, that firehose of moisture is directed by the jet stream. Movement of the jet stream just 50 miles to the north or south and a storm can go from hero to zero, with just that small shift. Typically that shift will dictate where snow levels sit. In the Tahoe region we can hope for an AR event with a good cold punch and see a huge snow dump. Or we can see 11,000 foot snow levels that erase a huge part of our snowpack, as we saw last February.
This discussion would not be complete without considering the impact of a warming planet. It’s real. As far as I know, nobody at Alpine Meadows is tracking temperature data as closely as they track snowfall data. Therefore we have to look at the larger scale picture of the northern Sierra Nevada. Here’s the general estimates of change since 1961:
- Winter temperatures have climbed 2.5 to 3.5 degrees Fahrenheit
- The average winter snow line has raised 400 to 600 feet
- Because atmospheric river events are warmer by nature already, winter snow lines during AR events have risen 600 to 900 feet.
So we can still get copious snow at higher levels of the Sierra Nevada. Alpine Meadows does have the challenge of a base area that sits at about 6850 feet. The last two seasons seem to have had more than our fair share of rain on the lower mountain.
We’re going to have to be patient to see how this season is going to turn out. The are some studies that show that weather in the Chilean Andes can be analogous to our weather in the Sierra Nevada. In the southern hemisphere, winter was slow to get off to a start. Mountains opened late with minimal snow pack – then a month later things went crazy. Ski areas received 3- 4 meters of snow within a 10 day period. This sounds somewhat like our start winter last season! Will it happen again?
For now, let’s just think positively and say it could happen. I will still be satisfied with just an average year.It’s probably too early to start chanting “Think snow!!”, eh?
So you’re saying there’s a chance? 🤣