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John Daley ReportingHere we are in May and in many places it feels more like winter. That means more snow fun, but also more worries about flood potential. And it's not just flood danger we should be worried about but avalanche danger. This latest round of storms has dumped easily a foot in a number of locations in the high country.
Snowbird ski resort says its gotten so much snow the last few days they're taking the unprecedented move of opening tomorrow and Friday, this is in addition to the weekend days they've already been open.
This season Snowbird reports they've gotten 615 inches of snow. The most they've received in a decade. Today backcountry enthusiasts were out enjoying the fresh powder as folks at the resort were gearing up to open up tomorrow.
Fritz Scott, Backcountry Skier: "Just getting up there. Doing a little skiing, it's actually my birthday. Never skied this late in the year. Just absolutely loving it."
Scott Fetters, Backcountry Skier: "I was in the desert yesterday and came back home to this and got stuck in the driveway at the lodge. Yeah it's quite a bit of snow. Pretty cool."
Kirk Ottman, Tram and Lift Electrical Supervisor: "It's heavy. It's thick. When you dig down through the layers, there's no thin layers. It is solid snow. And there's a lot of moisture content there and we're going to be skiing this for a while."
Weather watchers worry that we continue to add to mountain snowpack at a time when we should be melting it off. Once temperatures get really hot, the snow will melt quickly, and the fear is we could be seeing problems like in 1983 when a late, deep snowpack came tumbling down in the high temperatures causing flooding.
