Lasers in the sky: hi-tech missions track record snowpack loss in US west | West Coast
Over the jagged peaks of California’s Sierra Nevada, the view from the cockpit is breathtaking. At first glance, the mountains seem to be covered in a pristine white cover. But as the flight crew prepares for a high-risk mission, sensors on this particular plane prove that looks can be deceiving.
“This is a distinctly dry year,” says Tom Painter, CEO of Airborne Snow Observatories.
Painter, who developed this technology at NASA, does not rely on visual inspection. Its drones use Lidar, or rapid pulses of laser light, to calculate snow depth with surgical precision. “Lidar fires out about 800,000 pulses per second,” he explains. The result is a 3D map showing snow depth to an accuracy of 3 cm. The technology also helps determine how much water is stored in the snowpack.
In the U.S. West, where mountain ranges serve as “frozen reservoirs,” state water managers rely on this data as a survival guide. It helps millions of people plan exactly how much water will reach their taps and the critical agricultural areas that feed the country.
This year’s data is alarming.
A. record-break ‘faucet close closed‘
The national drought picture is becoming increasingly bleak. According to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor, more than 60% of the following 48 states are currently in drought. This is the most widespread period of spring dryness since monitoring began in 2000. While the southeast is currently battling “summer-sized” wildfires in Georgia and Florida, the west is facing a different kind of crisis: water shortages caused by snow droughts.
A record-warm winter followed by a severe heat wave in March, both fueled by heat-trapping pollution, wiped out much of the western snowpack. According to Climate Central, the total water stored in western snowpack this winter has reached its lowest level on record, when it should have reached its annual peak.
“In March, the spigot shut down and shut down across the entire western United States,” Painter says. “It’s a loss of snowpack that we’ve never seen before. It’s not on record. So this is unprecedented.”
The numbers back it up: Statewide snowpack in California was just 18% of average on April 1 and has declined since then.
LONG, dry Summer ahead
Standing next to a rushing stream outside Reno, Nevada, the state’s deputy state climatologist, Tom Albright, says spring runoff from mountain snowmelt is two months earlier than planned. “I wish we could have told him to stay there a little longer,” Albright says.
The danger of premature melting is twofold. First, when the snow melts, the land begins to dry months ahead of schedule, which can fuel wildfires. Second, large reservoirs on the Colorado River, which are already critically low, will not be replenished due to the lack of snow cover. “When we don’t have the snowpack, we lose the water there early and we’re left with this really long dry season,” Albright says. When asked what worries him most about the coming months, his answer is immediate: “Fire. Especially since we have such a large area affected.”
For decades, western water systems were built on the assumption that snow would stay in the mountains until the midsummer heat. The climate crisis is rewriting this playbook.
Although this year’s drought is abnormal given the historical record, experts warn that it is a preview of the decades to come.
“As we look ahead, this year will become less and less unusual, and at some point in the future it may not be extraordinary at all,” Albright warns.
