A snowmobiler riding with a group near Yosemite Sunday was airlifted to a trauma center after the group set off an avalanche, and one of the ski patrollers who was injured while performing avalanche mitigation work at Mammoth Mountain Friday has died.

As the Chronicle reports, 30-year-old ski patroller Cole Murphy died of his injuries after he and another ski patroller were caught in an avalanche while performing mitigation work on Mammoth Mountain Friday, as SFist previously reported. The other patroller had potential broken bones, but Murphy’s injuries were reportedly more extensive, per the Chronicle.

“The mountain was where Cole felt most alive. It was his place of purpose, community and his second home,” Cole’s family said in a statement, shared online. “Serving on ski patrol was not just a role for him – it was a calling.”

Per the Chronicle, another ski patroller was killed doing mitigation work ten months ago on Mammoth Mountain, which was hit with over five feet of snow Friday morning.

As KRON4 reports, about 100 miles north of Mammoth, a group of seven snowmobilers set off an avalanche around 11 am Saturday in the Bridgeport Winter Recreation Area near Latopie Lake in Mono County off Highway 108. One of the snowmobilers had to be dug out from the snow by the rest of the group when they became fully buried. They were airlifted to a level two trauma center in Reno, per KRON4.

Per SFGate, the avalanche was categorized as a D3 by the Mono County Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue team, which is strong enough to destroy a house and create a debris field “10 football fields long.”

The search-and-rescue team notes on Facebook that it's a volunteer-run group that provides its own equipment. Interested parties can donate here to support the team.

Image: Mono County Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue team

This past weekend's rains are going to extend through most of this first week of February as an inbound atmospheric river keeps the rain coming to the Bay Area, and promises some major snow in the Sierra.

Don't get too comfortable with Monday morning's reprieve from the wetness in SF. The rain has just temporarily shifted north, but plenty more is coming our way.

"Look for more widespread rainfall to gradually shift south throughout the day into tonight, along with strong winds persisting through Tuesday," the National Weather Service says in a 10:45 am update Monday.

The so-called Pineapple Express is still poised to bring more rain our way this week, with the Chronicle forecasting two more inches of rain in San Francisco over the next three days. Up north, in Northern Sonoma County and Mendocino, there could be upwards of three inches, and flood watches and advisories are going out for the region.

SF is under a Flood Watch as of Monday morning, extending through 4 am Wednesday.

Wind advisories are also in effect through 1 am Tuesday along the coast in San Francisco, and in the Marin County coastal range.

The area around the Russian River and Dry Creek Valley in Sonoma County is under a Flood Advisory that goes until tonight at 8:45 pm.

Areas around Cloverdale, as well as down in the Santa Cruz Mountains, are expected to see as much as six inches of rainfall between now and Friday — which, with already saturated soils from this weekend's rains, creates the potential for flooding.

Meanwhile, up in the Sierra, the biggest snows of the ski season to date could be on their way this week — and unless you're already on your way up there you may miss the powder days, if you're a skier or snowboarder, because the roads in could be closed at different points between now and Friday.

A Winter Storm Warning is in effect for multiple inland counties today through Wednesday morning.

Interstate 80 was already under chain controls over the weekend, though lower elevations around Lake Tahoe saw mostly rain.

Tahoe area residents are being warned of some very extreme weather coming their way — and even there's already been a good amount of snow up there, what's coming is a whole hell of a lot more.

The storm coming in, as we discussed earlier in the week, is not going to bring any particularly major amount of rain to the Bay Area — but, as the National Weather Service tells us, "the late week weather looks downright... unpleasant. Cold, windy, and cloudy with periods of rain. Dreary conditions will linger into Saturday."

Rainfall totals in San Francisco may not even top one inch over the course of three days, but some higher elevations down on the Peninsula and up in northern Sonoma County could see two or three inches this weekend.

The real story will be in the Sierra, where the National Weather Service has issued some very dire and rare warnings about the coming blizzard. Earlier forecasts had talked about ten feet of snow at higher elevations, and those have risen to up to 12 or 13 feet. The Tahoe basin itself, with lake level at 6,224 feet in elevation, could see around five feet of snow between Thursday and Saturday, and the weather service is warning that these will be "life-threatening blizzard conditions" at times.

Tahoe had a blizzard warning at this time last year, on February 27, 2023, but this storm sounds like it will be a record-breaker. It's forecast to be bigger, in fact, than a storm that landed in mid-March 2020, just before pandemic lockdowns began.

As Danny Chao of Truckee tells KPIX of that storm, "It was March 13th weekend, and I remember it was just, as soon as I shoveled the deck I'd go back inside, I'd look outside and there was another foot, 2 feet. It just accumulated so fast."

UC Berkeley’s Central Sierra Snow Laboratory is in Soda Springs, in Nevada County, and it sits at an elevation of 6,894 feet. The lab says it expecting to record snowfall totals that beat out some of its records of the snowiest days ever recorded there — if not the all-time snowiest, which hit 52 inches on February 3rd, 1989.

"If forecasts are correct, we have a real chance at beating the daily snowfall record at the Snow Lab," says Andrew Schwartz, lead scientist and manager of the lab, speaking to the Chronicle via email.

As the Chronicle explains, "The upcoming storm is colder than those that arrived earlier this winter, and is tracking toward California from the chilly Gulf of Alaska."

The frigid air coming in off the Pacific helps form icy clouds, which will be propelled further inland than earlier storms this season by a strong jet stream.

The wind will also be pretty intense in the Sierra — with wind gusts at the crests projected to hit 110 miles per hour.

And the "unusually cold nature of the storm," the Chronicle's meteorology team explains, means that lower elevations in the Sierra foothills could see up to a foot of snowfall, and we'll likely see snow on Bay Area peaks as well, down to 2,000 feet or below.

Everyone up in Truckee, Tahoe City, and other towns in the Tahoe area have been stocking up on supplies and making sure generators and snowblowers are gassed up.

"We don't know what the weather or what the power is going to be like, whether we're going to run out of power, so definitely having that extra storage, of canned goods that don't go bad as well as having a way to keep the items cold in the fridge so that if you do have a power outage, you're not losing your food," says Doug Farley, manager of Mountain Hardware & Sports, speaking to KPIX.

That store will stay open, Farley says, until the CHP or the town of Truckee tells them it's no longer safe and all employees should go home.

Photo: Tom Milkovic

San Francisco will get a sprinkling of rain starting Saturday morning, but the storm system moving in from the north will be bringing the first major snowfall of the winter season to the Sierra.

Weekenders with ski rentals and the like are being told to change their plans if they were planning on doing any driving Saturday, or maybe even skiing for that matter. Parts of the Sierra Nevada mountains including the Tahoe area will be seeing significant snowfall, and a Winter Storm Warning will be in effect from 4 a.m. Saturday to 6 a.m. Sunday for much of the region.

As you can see from the animation below, the Bay Area is on the western edge of the system, and as such we'll only be seeing light rain, while the majority of the precipitation will be hitting the mountains.

That could mean that Sunday will be an amazing ski day, but if you aren't headed up there already today, you may be missing it, because Saturday will be no day for driving around Lake Tahoe, and blizzard conditions are likely on I-80.

"Saturday is going to be a pretty treacherous day for travel," says Dylan Flynn, a National Weather Service forecaster, speaking to SFGate. "There are certainly going to be whiteout conditions on some of the roads and over passes. Anyway who wants to travel up there should consider going today [Friday] instead of tomorrow [Saturday]."

Some light snow is expected around the Tahoe area on Friday night, ahead of the actual storm. The bulk of the snowfall is expected in the Sierra between 10 a.m. and 10 p.m. Saturday, with gusty winds up to 50 miles per hour, and accumulation of around 3 inches per hour.

For us in San Francisco, you should get out for a walk today, because while the sun will be back out on Sunday, it's expected to be a fair bit chillier for the next week.

Photo: Tom Milkovic

The first winter storm in Bay Area this weekend drenched the region, caused temporary flooding, and even stirred up some lightning, all as a result of an unexpected and complex storm.

A low-pressure system brought several simultaneous storms to the Bay Area and Central Coast, Rick Canepa, a National Weather Service meteorologist, told SFGATE.

The North Bay reportedly received the highest rainfall, with Venado's rain gauge in Sonoma County registering a remarkable 4.82 inches. Other areas, including Oak Ridge, Bodega Bay, and Maribel Park, also saw substantial rainfall, reducing recent deficits, according to reports. San Francisco Bay shoreline recorded about four-tenths of an inch to an inch of rain, with downtown San Francisco receiving 1.27 inches. Surprisingly, the Paso Robles airport reported a record-breaking 1.74 inches of rain, exceeding the previous record set in 1982.

Meanwhile, along the California-Nevada border, an early winter storm deposited up to 10 inches of snow in Mt. Rose Ski Tahoe, seven inches in Mammoth Mountain ski base, and varying amounts to other areas, according to SFGATE.

As the low pressure rolls out of the Bay, meteorologists have issued a wind advisory for high elevation areas. The Marin coastal range, North Bay interior mountains, Solano County, Santa Cruz Mountains, East Bay hills, and Santa Clara hills are all included, according to the Chronicle. They could reportedly see sustained 25 to 35 mph winds with gusts of 45 mph from about 9 p.m. Sunday night, through 9 a.m. Monday.

Feature image via Unsplash/Osman Rana.

Lake Tahoe-area ski season has its first ski slope opening set for Friday, as Tahoe’s highest base elevation resort Mount Rose opens Friday, November 10, and more ski resort openings are scheduled for the weeks to follow.

Last winter was the second-snowiest winter on record in the Sierras, which certainly introduced some hazards, but also had the upside of presenting a pretty long and glorious ski season (except when roads and resorts were closed). We don’t know if a looming El Niño will bring similar levels of record precipitation this winter. But we do know, from the Chronicle’s new roundup of when Tahoe ski resorts are opening, that Reno’s Mount Rose ski resort is opening this Friday, November 10.

Three-day weekend, anybody?

More ski resort openings will follow the next weekend, and successive weekends into November and December. The Chronicle reports a number of other ski resort opening dates, which are listed below:

• Friday, November 10: Mt. Rose
• Friday, November 17: Boreal, Heavenly, and Northstar
• Wednesday, November 22: Palisades Tahoe
• Friday, November 24: Sugar Bowl
• Friday, December 1: Kirkwood
• Saturday, December 2: Sierra-at-Tahoe
• Thursday, December 7: Diamond Peak
• Friday, December 15: Homewood

And according to the National Weather Service, there may be more snowfall in the Sierras in the near future. The NWS adds above that “Above normal precipitation is likely throughout California next week,” and that the Sierra Nevada Mountains “have a 40 to 60% chance of heavy precipitation, with snow expected at higher elevations.”

Tahoe ski resorts opening for Veterans Day weekend is pretty normal, and last year, six of the above-named resorts opened on the second weekend of November. But it remains to be seen if, like this past ski season, some California ski resorts are open all the way until August.

Related: Tahoe Sees Second-Snowiest Winter on Record; Snow Buries Ski Lifts in Sierras [SFist]

Photo: Mt. Rose - Ski Tahoe via Facebook

This year’s record snowfalls are still reverberating in a good way, as Mono County’s Mammoth Mountain ski resort just announced they’ll allow skiing and snowboarding all the way out until August 6.

This winter’s incredible volumes of snow brought the second-snowiest winter on record to Lake Tahoe. But it was an all-time record-breaker some 150 miles south at Eastern Sierra ski resort Mammoth Mountain, with the snow piling so high it went to the top of the ski lifts at one point.

And lots of that snow is still there! Thus, according to the Chronicle, Mammoth Mountain is extending ski season through August 6.

“Following our historic and record-breaking season, we are stoked to announce that we’re staying OPEN for skiing and riding daily through Sunday, August 6,” the resort announced in a Thursday Facebook post. “It’s a rare treat - only twice in our 69-year history have we had enough snow to stay open into August (1995 and 2017).”

It’s not a full day of skiing. Lifts are only operating from 7:30 a.m. to noon, as the afternoon sun makes snow conditions too slushy to ride.

According to the Chronicle, the only other California ski resort to allow skiing anywhere near this late was Palisades Tahoe, which remained open through July 10.

Be aware that it is usually about a six-hour drive from San Francisco to Mammoth Mountain, and that’s if you don’t hit any traffic.

Related: Tahoe Sees Second-Snowiest Winter on Record; Snow Buries Ski Lifts in Sierras [SFist]
Image: Mammoth Mountain via Facebook

Even the tops of the ski lifts are buried in snow in the Lake Tahoe area, as this winter is now officially the second-snowiest season ever since records began being kept in 1946.

Yes, in the image above, you see a ski resort in the Sierra Nevada mountains where the snow goes all the way up to the top of the ski lift. The image is from Mammoth Mountain ski resort, a little more than a hundred miles south of Lake Tahoe. But they’re seeing record snowfalls across California’s entire central to northern Sierra Nevada mountain range. And the Reno Gazette Journal reports that at Donner Pass, a snow-measuring station just a few miles from Truckee is reporting this year has now seen the second-most snowfall ever recorded.

The UC Berkeley Central Sierra Snow Lab at Donner Pass says they have now recorded 677 inches of snow this winter, or roughly 56.5 feet. That counts accumulation going back to October 1, 2022, but still counts as this winter, as the snow starts falling pretty early at those elevations. (The UC Berkeley Central Sierra Snow Lab describes itself as being “at an elevation of 6894 ft.”)

The snowiest season on record so far at the lab was in 1952, when which counted up 812 inches of snow. So we're still nearly 150 inches shy of the all-time snow record, but certainly more snow is currently falling, and several more inches on the way this week.

And speaking of Donner Pass, we don't actually know how much snow fell in the Sierra during the brutal winter of 1846-47, leading to the Donner Party's infamous starvation woes. But it might have been something a lot like this winter!

Tuesday may be the first day of spring, but it sure doesn’t feel like it, either here in the Bay Area or in the Sierra Nevada mountains. And while all of these embedded images are breathtaking and eye-popping, we have to note there is a human toll to this walloping of snow, with the avalanches, rooftops caving in from snow, and dangerous conditions keeping people immobilized.

If you’re curious what the snowiest seasons ever were, the Bay Area News Group documents the ten snowiest winters ever recorded in the Lake Tahoe central Sierra region, per the graphic seen above. This season just surpassed 1982-83 (671 inches), and the all time record is 1951-52 (812 inches).

Related: Snow Is Literally Crushing Buildings In Tahoe Area [SFist]

Image: Mammoth Mountain via Facebook

The weight of massive snow accumulation on rooftops has led to at least two destroyed buildings in the Tahoe area and Sierra foothills, with more perhaps to come.

Residents of Lake Tahoe and surrounding communities that have seen intense amounts of snowfall the past few weeks are being advised to get their roofs professionally cleared of snow if they are seeing significant accumulation there. This comes as reports are trickling in of destroyed buildings whose roofs caved in under the weight of a lot of snow.

One of those was the congregation meeting hall of Calvary Chapel Foresthill, in the Placer County community of Foresthill, which experienced a roof collapse Tuesday night. Church rep Janice Allen shared the news with its congregation on Facebook, saying, "It is with sad news that I inform you, that last night the Carpenters Place (where we meet) roof collapsed from the snow load. I think the damage is total."

Allen added, "Like Pastor Dan said, 'it is not the building but the people that make up the church.'"

Pastor Daniel Cordova spoke to KPIX, saying of the first time he saw the damage, "Honestly, like, I just gasped, and I don't normally gasp, that's not something I do, I just saw it, and I was like 'oh.'"

In the community of Foresthill, just a day earlier, a deadly porch collapse due to the weight of snow took the life of an 80-year-old woman.

One are resident, Jay Davis, tells KPIX, regarding the snow, "I've never seen it this bad. It's pretty horrible."

As KRON 4 further reports, "In the South Lake Tahoe area, a warehouse building on the 1100 block of Melba Drive was found completely buried and crushed under the weight of the snow by crews from the South Lake Tahoe Fire Rescue."

That building had last been seen standing on Tuesday.

South Lake Tahoe Fire Rescue posted to social media, advising residents, “Consider snow loads on your own roof. Hire experts to remove snow if you are seeing greater than 3’ on your roof."

Whole communities in the Sierra have lost power in the recent storms, and PG&E continues working to restore it.

The recent snowfall, on top of significant accumulation from last week and the week before, has caused avalanches and plenty of other troubles for the Tahoe area. One apartment building near Palisades Tahoe was partially buried by an avalanche and had to be evacuated. And on Wednesday morning we learned that there were hundreds of cars stranded on I-80, with trucks backed up for miles near the Nevada border after whiteout conditions over night Tuesday into Wednesday.

The current gigantic snow dump, combined with January’s storms, could break 40-year-old snowpack records in parts of the state, as the forecast calls for more cold and precipitation through March and possibly into April.

How bad is the current Lake Tahoe-area snowstorm, which has brought traffic to a halt on I-80 and caused avalanche evacuations? For the answer to that question, look no further than the Sugar Bowl Resort marketing office, whose doors opened Wednesday morning to the sight below.

Those early January storms and floods feel like years ago, as we’ve seen so much extreme weather since, and it’s fair to say at this point that 2023 is shaping up to be a very weird weather year. Now the Chronicle reports that the parts of the Sierra snowpack could break 40-year-old records, as this week’s storm is expected to continue for days, with plenty more precipitation is expected through the month of March.

“Statewide, the snowpack is 181% of average for this time of year and 156% of average for April 1, when the California snowpack typically peaks,” the Chronicle reports. “In some parts of the Sierra, snowpack levels are even on pace to surpass totals for the 1982-1983 season — the winter of record in the modern era.”

But to unpack this snowpack talk, parts of the Sierra region are on pace to break records, others are not. As the Chron explains, the Southern Sierra is ahead of snowpack levels from that 1982-1983 record, the Central Sierra is a little behind that record pace, and the Northern Sierra is well behind the pace of that 1982-1983 winter record. But all of these areas are far ahead of their snowfall averages for this time of year.

“It’s very possible we’ll end up vying for one of the top two snow years on record in parts of the state,” UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain said in his latest weather video podcast Monday. “We’re going to end this year with a very large Sierra Nevada snowpack,”

As seen above, Palisades Tahoe estimates that they’ve gotten “over 12 FEET of snow” this week. Longer-term forecasts predict that rain is expected to continue through March (here in the Bay Area, it’s predicted that the rain will return Saturday), and possibly into April.  That is good for drought conditions, though, as UC Berkeley Central Sierra Snow Lab lead scientist and manager Andrew Schwartz tells the Chronicle, “This is the year, I think, that a lot of us were looking for.”

Related: Avalanche Buries Tahoe Apartment Building, Several Areas Evacuated Over Avalanche Risk [SFist]

Image: @sugarbowlresort via Twitter

Photo: CHP Truckee

Yosemite National Park is officially closed due to the ongoing severe winter storm conditions through at least Wednesday, March 1st.

The National Park Service announced the closure on Saturday, saying the park would not be accessible to the public for these few days. Only administrative traffic will be allowed through the El Portal Road entrance, the extension of HWY 140 into the park.

Yosemite National Park is now closed through Wednesday, March 1, due to severe winter conditions.

— Yosemite National Park (@YosemiteNPS) February 25, 2023

All other roads into the park — Wawona Road, Big Oak Flat Road , Yosemite Valley Roads, Hetch Hetchy Road, Tioga Road, Badger Pass Road, and Mariposa Grove Road — are closed, according to NPS' website.

The storm that caused this week’s snow in the Bay Area is moving east into the mountains and becoming even worse, according to KRON4. Whiteout snow conditions have been reported across Yosemite.

According to park rangers tasked with surveying the snow, the average snow depth across the park is already 122 inches at the beginning of February.

January brought snow to the Sierra Nevada, with 181 in. of snow falling in Tuolumne Meadows! Our winter rangers are halfway through this month’s snow surveys and the average snow depth of surveys completed is 122 inches. Learn more in this week's update: https://t.co/WCVtmTeHtY pic.twitter.com/KiHjsR34wB

— Yosemite National Park (@YosemiteNPS) February 2, 2023

You can even watch a live video of Upper Yosemite Falls, one of the world’s tallest waterfalls, to see the current conditions, on the Yosemite Conservancy’s website. Snow-capped mountain peaks and snow-covered pine trees dot the landscape.

Mercury News reported that the last time that heavy snowfall and storms have closed access to the park was in February of 2019, when four days of heavy snow made the valley's roads impassable.

Yosemite has already seen some serious weather impacts in the past week week: a massive rockslide occurred on El Capitan, the towering granite monolith on the north side of Yosemite Valley, causing tons of boulders to cascade down from its 3,000-foot face, according to ABC7.

Roads and trails in Yosemite National Park were forced to close after a rockfall. Video from close range captures growing clouds of debris, as rocks are seen crashing down the edge of the famed rock formation El Capitan. ⛰️📸😲 pic.twitter.com/FOuH3qW3DD

— ABC7 Eyewitness News (@ABC7) February 23, 2023

RELATED: Snowfall Shuts Down Roads, Delights Kids Around the Bay; Lightning Hits SF [SFist]

Image via National Parks Service.

This storm system has been no joke, and while much of the Bay Area saw significant rainfall in the last 24 hours, many spots that don't usually see snow accumulation saw plenty between Thursday and Friday, leading to some surprises on local roads.

Meteorologists familiar with the Bay and its microclimates aren't generally accustomed to predicting snowfall accumulations outside of the Sierra. And while most winters typically see some light snows on Mount St. Helena, Mount Diablo, and Mount Hamilton, snow on the ground in Healdsburg, Santa Rosa, and Oakland is a good bit less common.

As National Weather Service (NWS) meteorologist Brooke Bingaman tells NBC Bay Area, "This is a very rare event. It’s like Mother Nature has thrown us a jigsaw puzzle that we don’t often get to put together."

Areas around northern Sonoma and Napa counties saw between 2 and 3 inches of snowfall on Thursday night, and this led to a traffic snarl on typically quiet back road, Calistoga Grade (Petrified Forest Rd.). The connector between Santa Rosa and Calistoga became slippery, leading to an ambulance landing in a ditch and snowplow getting stuck, which in turn led to a 25-car backup on the road, as photojournalist Kent Porter documented on Twitter.

Cloverdale saw significant accumulations of snow well below 1000 feet of elevation, as the NWS reported, with as much as 4 inches on the ground. As a result, all schools are closed in the Cloverdale Unified School District today.

Before the sun set on Thursday, people posted photos of snow on the ground in Healdsburg, on Skyline Boulevard in San Mateo County, and in the Oakland hills — all elevations that typically don't see snow.

The effects of the storm shut down Highway 17 in the Santa Cruz Mountains early Friday, due to heavy snowfall and downed trees.

A Getty Images photographer captured some kids playing in the snow in Angwin, in Napa County, Friday morning.

Snowfall accumulation totals are still being collected, and the NWS put out a call on Twitter Friday morning for reports specifically from Calistoga and St. Helena.

As the Press Democrat reports, via the NWS, it's been 12 years since Sonoma County has seen any snowfall below 1000 feet, and the local weather service office doesn't track or keep snowfall totals.

San Francisco, meanwhile, saw heavy rain for much of Thursday night into Friday morning. This led to a ramp closure off 101 north in SoMa, where the Department of Public Works shut down the connector to Octavia Boulevard, apparently due to pooling water.

Thunder and bright lightning also came to SF, with least one documented lightning strike to the Transamerica Pyramid around 11:30 p.m.

This is the second time this winter that a storm system has brought rare lightning to SF, the first being back on January 10.

Top image: A sign for a vineyard is seen covered in snow on February 24, 2023 in Angwin, California. A large winter storm brought snow to lower elevations overnight in the Napa Valley. Much of California is being impacted by a cold winter storm that is bringing rain, wind a snow below 1,500 feet in many locations. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

A low-pressure system will make its way from British Columbia down to California this week, bringing cold temperatures, strong winds, and the possibility of both rain and snow to the Bay Area.

Although San Francisco is seeing temperatures up in the 60s Saturday, the nice weather should flip on Tuesday when the low-pressure system descends, according to the Chronicle’s meteorology team.

It’s not certain yet how much moisture will accompany the low-pressure system, but because it’s approaching the Bay from over the Pacific Ocean, it could easily pick up some more, which would lead to some rain showers from Tuesday night through Friday morning.

Heads up! Active weather returns next week. Widespread rain, breezy winds, and cold temperatures are all possible. While it's too early for specific details keep checking back for forecast updates! #cawx pic.twitter.com/hmNj6YElhs

— NWS Bay Area 🌉 (@NWSBayArea) February 16, 2023

And the freezing air in the system could also mean that morning lows could easily drop to 30 degrees before sunrise across the East Bay, particularly in Dublin and Walnut Creek on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday mornings.

There is a chance that these factors combined could mean that some areas, particularly at higher elevations such as the Berkeley and Oakland Hills, would see some light snowfall. However, these would likely just be flurries that don’t stick on the ground, the Chronicle reported.

The places nearby with the highest chances of snowfall are the Diablo Range and the highest peaks of the Santa Cruz Mountains, which are likely to see at least half an inch to an inch of snow.

Lot of hype right now regarding supposed potential for widespread "sea level snowfall" later next week NorCal.

That almost certainly isn't going to happen (for variety of reasons). But some unusually low elevation snowfall (to 1000-1,500 feet or so) is certainly possible. #CAwx

— Daniel Swain (@Weather_West) February 16, 2023

It would be a rare occurrence for the region, which, as residents know, typically experiences mild winters with no snow. San Francisco will probably avoid snow, however, due to the marine layer.

Meteorologists warned that residents should watch for icy roads and take necessary precautions.

Image via Unsplash/Andre Tan.

Anyone looking to get a jump on ski season and this first big snowfall up around Lake Tahoe should probably have left yesterday, as snowy roadways are already causing problems for drivers in the area.

Parts of the Sierra were forecast to get upwards of two to three feet of snow from this storm system, and conditions on the roads were already degrading Thursdsay morning. CHP Truckee posted the photo below of a jackknifed big rig on I-80 westbound at Hirschdale Road around 11:30 a.m. That was expected to cause delays for all westbound travelers near Truckee.

Chain controls are in effect for various mountain roadways, and a CBS reporter out of Sacramento was documenting the snowfall in Strawberry, along Highway 108 south of the Tahoe area. And backcountry avalanche warnings have been issued.

"Persistent snowfall rates of 1-2"/hour are expected for up to 12 hours, with short bursts of enhanced 3-4"/hour rates possible around the time of cold front passage," says the National Weather Service, regarding conditions in the Tahoe region.

Cold temperatures on Friday morning, as the cold front passes through, could mean icy roads as well, which leaves likely only a small safe window for travelers to Tahoe with more precipitation expected Friday and Saturday. And leaving the area on Sunday is likely to be challenging to impossible as well.

The National Weather Service warned drivers to avoid traveling to Tahoe between 10 p.m. Wednesday and 10 a.m. Friday.

Drivers are being advised, if they do plan to make the trek, to use the CHP's QuickMap site to check for delays and road closures.