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SUMMIT COUNTY — Some people aren't so happy about a snowstorm right after Easter, but it has been helpful for Utah's water supply.
Utah has gone from a bad water situation to a better scenario than it has seen in five years.
Monday’s snowstorm is one of several snowpack-saving storms to hit the state over the last few weeks. Before it's over in a couple of days, Utah may add a foot or two to the high elevation snowpack, and an inch of water.
This is exactly what Utah needs to make up for a dismal February, water wise.
"We got really warm, and there was an absence of storminess and we had a lot of sunshine," said Brian McInerney, a hydrologist with the National Weather Service.
Due to the warm weather in February statewide, most of the snowpack below the 8,000 foot level melted. The mountains should be adding snow and not losing snow through the first week of April.
"If we continue with this pattern, we're going to be in pretty bad shape," said McInerney.
However, the last few weeks has changed the picture.
In addition to adding more water to the snowpack, the storm is also keeping the existing snowpack from melting early. Snowpack in northern Utah is now 95 to 100 percent of average, and about 85 percent in southern Utah.
"If we can have a lot more storms, a lot more cold temperatures, and keep this going through April, we will reinforce the snowpack in a big way, and that's really helpful," said McInerney.
Runoff is expected to be 65 to 70 percent of average this spring. A lot of the water will soak into the soil on the way to the reservoirs following four very dry years.
"We had dry soil, we have low groundwater. ...We've got a pretty good snowpack, right about average, but it's on a very dry sponge," McInerney said.
A cool, wet spring could offset some of that deficit in the reservoirs.
"We do not anticipate them filling at this time, but if we look back at some of these really big El Niño years, we got a very wet spring, and hopefully that will happen this year," said McInerney.
