This is an epic ski week at Brundage Mountain in McCall. I missed Monday and as luck would have it, consensus opinion “most amazing day ever.” I rode the Chairlift with a bartender who admitted one of his pet peeves was his customers taking delight in reminding him he missed the ski day of the century. Another chair mate was kinder, when asked how the skiing was Monday he replied “it did not suck.” An old dude and his wife who live nearby simply said, “nothing to complain about”. The grisly but eloquent gentleman wore an army helmet and sported generous amounts of facial hair-never judge a book as they say. A cheerful farmer from Eastern Washington acknowledged that Monday was a top 5 ski day. He continued to explain the prolific snow pattern we were enjoying was the result of an atmospheric river. I had to find out what he understood that made the non stop moisture pattern seem logical.
The atmospheric river (AR) is real! AR is a narrow corridor or filament of concentrated moisture, enhanced water vapor, in the atmosphere. Researchers from MIT in the early 1990’s discovered the narrowness of these plumes, several thousand kilometers long and only several hundred kilometers wide. A single AR can carry a greater flux of water than the Earth’s largest river-the Amazon. The 2018 U. S. Global Change Research Program highlighted that 30-40% of the West Coast snow and precipitation is caused by land falling atmospheric rivers. The study goes on to suggest “as the earth warms” higher water levels in the air from evaporation will produce land falling AR’s on our West Coast more often and at higher intensity. Steven Chu, a noted Professor of Physics says, “The climate is changing. The proper political debate would be how to deal with these risks.”
A bit of humor to end our week. I always enjoyed George Carlin growing up for his clever word play-he advised “weather forecast for tonight-dark.” Mark Twain opined, “climate is what we expect-weather is what we get.”
Make a few tracks in the snow this week end. Mike