Explain this one to me... Paradise vs. Crystal

What led to these observations as of April 1st... Amar? Others?

CURRENT CLIMATE PER CENT
DEPTH AVERAGE OF NORMAL
CRYSTAL 80 69 116
PARADISE 141 174 81

Are you confused that Crystal is above average, while Rainier is below?
I suspect it's because of the absence of big honking upslope events over the past month or two. Those kind of storms tend to favor places like Paradise, and drop less or nothing in the rain shadow of the mountain. But all the little storms add up, and I think a lot of them have been coming in from the northeast, which helps Crystal. They just don't add up to the 250+ it takes to get Paradise above average.

That's my guess anyway.

My guess would be that for one, we have had a couple instances of wet, warm southwesterly flow that really decimated the snowpack at Paradise.  They lost something like 40 inches of depth in the first two weeks of March at Paradise.  Crystal is usually shadowed somewhat during those events. Also the early season storms, from my recollection, consisted of a couple landfalling cyclones that bring southerly flow favoring places like Crystal and Mission.   

Excellent hypotheses.

One attributes it mostly to warm rainy events that have hurt Paradise (and a little more snow at Crystal)...

One attributes it to lack of snow at Paradise and more snow at Crystal...

Interesting...

I think it has simply been the case that Crystal has enjoyed a far-above-average snow year, due to several storms with favorable winds causing heavy snowfall in a normally snow-starved location. Crystal's average April 1 snow depth of 69" is very small for a location at 4400 ft in the WA Cascades (as is White Pass' average of 53"), so it only take a few extra favorable storms to boost its percentage way above normal. Crystal's year to date snowfall of 431" is about 128% of normal.

I know this season will be remembered by skiers as an exceptional snow year in the Cascades, but it was only that good in early season, at lower elevations, and farther north. From Stevens Pass on south (all the way through OR and CA), it has actually been a below average snow year at elevations above 4000-5000 ft (with a few exceptions like Crystal). This is mainly due to low precipitation and numerous lengthy dry spells during the winter. Paradise is certainly well below normal for precip since Nov 15 (after all the floods), although I don't have the numbers on hand. Snowfall at Paradise for the year to date is only 539", versus 675" last year and the long term average of about 610" by this date. Thankfully, Pineapple Expresses did not harm the snowpack this season, as none occurred at all from late Nov until early March, which is highly unusual. But there just wasn't much precip or snowfall up high this year.

The apparent "loss" of snowpack at Paradise from March 1 to March 15 is largely a data artifact. Very heavy snowfall was received during the week up to March 1, boosting the snow depth far above average by that date (but not much above average for snow water content). Then the snowfall stopped, rapid settlement began, and was accelerated by the rainstorms of March 4 and March 10-11, so it looked like 40" of snowpack had vanished at Paradise. But there was no loss in SWE, as can be seen from the last 40 days of data from the 5120 ft Paradise SNOTEL site . Although the snowdepth is below average right now, the snowpack is much more well-settled than normal for early April, and so any additional spring snowfall will rapidly build the depth. Note that Paradise averages 92" of snowfall after April 1 (14% of its annual total, versus e.g. only 32" for Snoqualmie Pass, 7% of its annual total), so spring storms could still boost the snowpack at Paradise back above average by April 15 or May 1. Crystal is unlikely to realize any further gains.

Couldn't have said it better myself!

Amar - how about the area in and around Mt. St. Helens that you are always amazed by exceptionally high snowpack #'s?

So, are you saying the lone beast of the S. Washington Cascades needs to get done earlier than the end of June this year?  HAHAHA