Storm dumps six feet of snow on Mammoth Mountain

Mammoth awoke to a world transformed by a winter storm that, by all accounts, “overperformed” original expectations this week.

There is a new six-feet-plus blanket of snow on Mammoth Mountain and about three feet of snow in the town of Mammoth. Streets and roadways are lined with snow; sidewalks and cafes are rimmed in ice and snow; the parking lots look like ice rinks and feel like them, too.

The leaves are gone, the snowplows are out, the winter clothes and boots and scrapers and the woodpile have been hastily dug out, along with the skis and snowshoes.

Winter, it seems, has arrived, with one of the best, early season storms in decades, a welcome change from more than enough years that didn’t see any real snow until after the New Year, if then.

But will it last?

That, said forecasters, is still unclear. Although the Climate Prediction Center has pegged November as a wetter than normal month for the Sierra, the same agency forecasts the Sierra to dry out in December and January, with perhaps a return to wetter conditions after that.

Mammoth forecaster Howard Sheckter thinks it’s far too soon, however, to talk about the winter ahead, although he too has hinted that mid-winter might go dry, before going possibly wet later in the winter.

He prefers to focus on the next few weeks.

“There might be something that gets in here early next week that may bring some showers or light snowfall,” he said.