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Burned trees in the snow at Smith Peak in Yosemite National Park. Photo credit: Nickolay Stanev, Shutterstock.
Severe Summer Wildfires Are Impacting Western U.S. Mountain Snowpack During Winter and Spring
Published on

In recent years, wildfires have become more frequent, larger, and burn at higher severity across the western United States and especially in California. A recently published NIDIS-funded study led by scientists with the Desert Research Institute was motivated by an extended dry spell in the winter of 2021-2022 following multiple severe high elevation fires in California.

A thin layer of snow atop dry, cracked soil, representing snow drought. Image credit: Chris Redan, Shutterstock.
Western Snow Season 2022-23 Preview: A Look at Water Supplies and the Winter Outlook in 10 Maps
Published on

These ten maps provide an overview of water storage in the West and a winter snow drought outlook for Water Year 2023. The maps  show how previous La Niña winters have impacted precipitation and temperature across the U.S., the latest National Weather Service outlooks that are influenced by these past La Niña events, and water supply issues in the West, and snow drought conditions.

Day 8-14 U.S. Hazards Outlook with Rapid Onset Drought

The Climate Prediction Center's Day 8–14 (Week 2) U.S. Hazards Outlook shows potential hazardous conditions related to temperature, precipitation, wind, snow, and rapid onset drought.

Data Coverage
United States
Period of Record
Outlook
File Format
images
shapefile
kml
Data Type
Model
2022 U.S. Drought and Heat Webinar: The Southern Plains
Event Date
July 21, 2022
2:00 pm - 3:45 pm
CDT
Location
Virtual

NOAA’s National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS) and National Integrated Heat Health Information System (NIHHIS) co-hosted two webinars in collaboration with their federal, tribal, state, and local partners, focused on drought and heat in the West and the Southern Plains. The second webinar, held from 2 p.m. to 3:45 p.m. CT on July 21, focused on the Southern Plains (Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas).

2022 U.S. Drought and Heat Webinar: The West
Event Date
July 21, 2022
10:00 am - 12:00 pm
MDT
Location
Virtual

NOAA’s National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS) and National Integrated Heat Health Information System (NIHHIS) co-hosted two webinars in collaboration with their federal, tribal, state, and local partners, focused on drought and heat in the West and the Southern Plains. The first webinar, held from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. MT on July 21, focused on the Western U.S. (Southwest, California, Pacific Northwest, Missouri River Basin, and Alaska).

Navajo Nation Drought Severity Evaluation Tool

The Navajo Nation Drought Severity Evaluation Tool (DSET) is a co-developed cloud-based web application designed to meet the needs of water resource managers from the Navajo Nation, improving drought reporting and management.

Data Coverage
Regional
United States
Period of Record
Period of Record Varies
File Format
images
pdf
csv
geotiff
other
Data Type
Blended Products
Land-based Station
Model
Satellite
Midwest DEWS Research Webinar – Characteristics and Predictability of Midwest Drought: February 2, 2022
Damaged corn crops in the Midwest U.S.
Event Date
February 2, 2022

This Midwest DEWS research webinar presented results from a NIDIS-funded research study that was recently published in the Journal of Hydrometeorology.

Intermountain West Ski Dashboard

The Intermountain West Ski Dashboard was created as a resource for decision makers within the ski industry in the Intermountain West (Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming). 

Data Coverage
Regional
United States
Period of Record
Current Conditions, Forecasts
File Format
images

Standardized Snow Water Equivalent (SWE) / Hypsome-SWE

This dataset contains estimates of standardized snow pack anomalies based on the depth of snow water equivalent (SWE), from NOAA/NOHRSC's SNOw Data Assimilation System (SNODAS). Hypsome-SWE represents a method to evaluate the distribution of SWE across watersheds.

Data Coverage
Regional
Period of Record
2004–present
File Format
images
Data Type
Model

NCEI Past Weather Tool

The NCEI Past Weather Tool allows users to search for historical temperature, precipitation, snowfall, and snow depth data for individual weather stations across the United States, as well as many international locations. Stations are part of the GHCN (Global Historical Climatology Network)-Daily dataset. 

Data Coverage
Global
Period of Record
1763–Present (Varies by Station)
File Format
pdf
text (ascii)
csv
json
xml
Data Type
Land-based Station
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