Flying over the Sierra Nevada, teams are using lasers to measure California's vast snowpack, tracking flood risks as the snow melts.
Flying thousands of feet above the Sierra Nevada in a plane equipped with specialized imaging devices, Elizabeth Carey has been scanning the mountains with lasers to precisely map the snow.
Thomas Painter, co-founder of Airborne Snow Observatories, stands on the tarmac near one of the planes used to fly over the mountains to collect detailed data about the snowpack at Mammoth Yosemite Airport. Across the Sierra Nevada, this year’s snowpack peaked at about 2.7 times the average, weighing an estimated 55 billion tons, according to Painter.for this time of year, and the southern Sierra is buried in snow that measures more than four times the average for mid-May.Advertisement
The aerial surveys provide a three-dimensional picture of each watershed that is similar to a CT scan, helping to guide decisions about releasing water from dams under high-flow conditions, said Wes Monier, chief hydrologist of the Turlock Irrigation District. The district manages releases from Don Pedro Reservoir, which is now 73% full.
The lasers penetrate less than a centimeter into the snow, allowing the team to compare each measurement to snow-free readings of the landscape, revealing how deep the snowpack is.
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