By Thomas Hughes. Bay City News.
Sierra Nevada snowpack and state reservoirs got a big boost from recent and ongoing California storms, but not enough to end current drought conditions, officials with the state Department of Water Resources said. during a briefing this Wednesday.
"We are working our way through a flood emergency, but there will be underlying components of the drought that will persist even when this is all over," said Michael Anderson, state climatologist.
Anderson said Sierra snowpack is at full seasonal levels expected by April 1 for an average year, but said it was hard to forecast how much it would fluctuate in the meantime, and excessive melting could present more flooding risks.
Two more storms are forecast to hit California in the next 10 days. Another 3 to 4 inches of rain is forecast for the Bay Area during those storms, and 2 to 3 inches on the Central Coast. Those will mark the end of a series of nine storms that will hit the state beginning December 30.
Anderson said river levels will continue to fluctuate after the series of storms passes, and flooding remains a risk in multiple areas, including five waterways the water resources agency focused on, including Bear Creek and the rivers Pajaro, Salinas, Cosumnes and Russian.
Anderson said mudslides were a major concern given the volume of rain hitting the steep terrain, some of which has been burned by recent wildfires.
Water levels peaked in the Pajaro River Tuesday morning and are now receding, according to Jeremy Arrich, manager of the department's flood management division. Flooding near the river forced an evacuation this week.
Arrich said water levels in the Salinas River are forecast to peak sometime Friday night and stay at peak levels through the weekend. A team of specialists was in the river to treat multiple boils, which are areas near a levee that break on the dry side and leak water.
Record flood levels were reached at Bear Creek in Merced County, Arrich said. The department has deployed 576 linear feet of muscle wall, which is a portable barrier, along with 100,000 sandbags and plastic sheeting to help combat flooding in the area.
The Russian River is near flood stage and is expected to remain at that level for several days.
"It's quite a dynamic situation, things are changing quickly and the flood operations center and our teams on the ground remain ready to assist as needed and see if any further assistance is requested," Arrich said.
Molly White, the department's operations manager, said reservoirs across the state are at 84 percent of the historical average, up from 81 percent on Tuesday.
"These storms continue across the state to help with our reservoir storage levels," White said.
White explained that Shasta and Oroville reservoirs experienced steep increases in water levels, but are still lower than others due to their record lows before the storms. Shasta has 1.9 million acre-feet and Oroville has about 1.7 million acre-feet of water, which is 70 percent and 88 percent of their historical averages, respectively.
"Every day we get closer to average conditions," White stressed.
She noted that that's about 2 million acre-feet in the two main reservoirs at this time of year.
In other California reservoirs, Lake Sonoma is at 83 percent of its historical average levels, San Luis Reservoir is at 60 percent of its historical average, Camanche Reservoir is at 123 percent, and Lake New Melones is at 56 percent of historical levels.
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