Re: Tioga plows have reached the pass

Plows reached Tioga Pass on Tuesday, April 22, while a few inches of new snow was falling. However, more plowing is needed to widen the plowed portion of road, plow side roads and parking lots, and peel ice from sections of the road near Tuolumne Meadows. Additional ditching and tree work may also be required. The weather forecast calls for snow Thursday night through Sunday night.


Tioga Road plowing between Tuolumne Meadows and Tioga Pass, April 22, 2014.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/23/2014 12:48PM by eeek.

Well let there be snow and bury all that much too early plowing setting them back to mid May.

From Handford NWS today Wednesday,

...A RELATED CONCERN IS THAT THE COLD POOL WILL DROP SNOW LEVELS TO
AROUND 4000 FEET AT YOSEMITE VALLEY SATURDAY MORNING AND TO AROUND
4400 FEET IN THE TEHACHAPI MOUNTAINS. THIS IS THE ELEVATION OF THE
HIGHEST POINTS OF BOTH THE GRAPEVINE AND TEHACHAPI PASS AND LIGHT
ACCUMULATIONS OF SNOW OR A RAIN/SNOW MIX WILL BE POSSIBLE ON THESE
PASSES SATURDAY MORNING. THE MODELS HAVE THE HEAVIEST PRECIPITATION FRIDAY AND FRIDAY EVENING
WITH A SHARP DROP OFF SATURDAY MORNING. FOR YOSEMITE VALLEY...MOST
OF THE PRECIPITATION IS EXPECTED TO FALL AS RAIN...WITH THE COLDEST
AIR MOVING IN AFTER THE MAJORITY OF PRECIPITATION HAS ENDED. STILL...
AN INCH OR TWO OF SNOW ON THE VALLEY FLOOR IS POSSIBLE SATURDAY
MORNING.

So could see snow on the valley floor Saturday morning? May change my weak weekend plans and Friday after work directly drive up to the usual jeep road place I overnight along SR49 south of Coulterville. Then dawn drive in on SR140 and see what might be worthwhile. After morning light gets too harsh will head back down by El Portal where there ought to be enough late spring wildflower closeup work to keep me occuppied. This spring despite the droughty conditions has yet been another one I've managed to find some goods. See bottom of this page, last two rows #31 and #32. The poppy image was down in the lower Merced River canyon 4 weekends ago.

http://www.davidsenesac.com/Gallery_B/gallery_b.html

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http://www.davidsenesac.com



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 04/23/2014 01:19PM by DavidSenesac.

We drove from the park to Hites Cove on Saturday and didn't even go down the trail because we could not see many flowers as we have had in the past from the road. Hate to say this but we were heat wimps and my son had a bike accident a few days before and we did not want to hike back and see if it got better. There were still flowers on the hillsides near the sewer plant and along the road closer to El Portal. The dogwoods in the valley should be better this week.

Yeah tis now dogwood time. Given the troughy flow may actually be a decent weekend for understory work if clouds linger providing diffuse conditions.

When I was in the canyon 4 weeks ago, did hike up initial part of the Hite Cove trail just to see what things looked like. Although there were good numbers of bright fresh poppies, they sort of looked similar to the noted image in my link taken further up the canyon. Lots of short poppy plants about the same height with flowers not very robust looking maybe due to the very droughty early winter. Suspect the areas on the trail from the water tower around the bend along Moss Creek is where conditions may still be ok for more intimate frames. Also always interesting late season biota like clarkia in miles of serpentine geology north of the McClure crossing on SR49.

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http://www.davidsenesac.com

Tossed gear into Forester this morning so will head off directly from work later this afternoon towards the Merced and be in the tripod lineup early tomorrow even though forecast has raised snow levels above the valley floor.

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http://www.davidsenesac.com

Just looked at the Yosemite West cam and there is snow. Have a great time. I wish we were going again this weekend.