California Snow in June?

by Brent Reed

I had an opportunity to have a window seat on my flight back to Fresno, CA on 6-16-2023.  As best as I could tell we flew over the Sierra Nevada Mountains on a path that took us over Kings Canyon National Park and Pine Flat Reservoir.  As you can tell by the photos there is a tremendous amount of snowpack still left to melt off.  I’ve traveled this route in past years at this time where one would be hard pressed to find any visible snow in the high country at this time of year. 

This made me wonder how much snow was remaining in these areas?  I did some research and found a USDA Forest Service Current Snow Depth map.  This map indicates that there is 59 to 98 inches in some areas but if one looks in the area east of Visalia, CA which I believe is in the Mineral King area, there appears to be 98 to 197 inches of snowpack remaining.  In comparison, China Peak Ski resort, which is about 65 miles north of Mineral King receives an annual average of 200 inches of snow per year and reports zero or no snowpack remaining in the month of June.  Based on these findings the snowpack near Mineral King is near the annual average snowfall of China Peak when in most years the snow depth at this time of year is less than a few inches.   This is a good demonstration of the remarkable water year that we are experiencing in California.