Snow pack still below normal after storms

Recent snow storms across the Western Slope have been great for ski resorts and the mountain snow pack, but is all this snow enough to help end the current drought?

The simple answer is no. Even with the snow we've had in the past few weeks, hydrologists and water experts say we still have quite a ways to go.

"We're still very dry for this year", explained Aldis Strautins, hydrologist at the National Weather Service office in Grand Junction.

Western Colorado has been fortunate to see several snow storms in the past few weeks. While it significantly helped the snow pack, levels are still much lower than average.

'"We're coming off an extremely dry water year in 2012 and this year we were on track to not even get close to last years really low snow pack. But with the most recent winter storms, we've at least caught up to last year which is good news" said Hannah Holm, Coordinator for the Water Center at Colorado Mesa University.

Still, the Gunnison and Upper Colorado River Basins are only about two thirds of normal. The snow pack in Colorado is a lifeline for the state and it provides most of the water we need all year long.

"Well the snow pack is tremendously important to our community, both for the winter recreation that draws a lot of people to Colorado, but also it is actually our biggest reservoir for our water uses" explains Holm.

The city of Grand Junction is on track to have one of its top 3 driest years ever on record and with the current neutral weather cycle, there's no telling how soon we could be out of this drought.

"You can have really dry years and we've had really wet years and everything in between during some neutral cycles. So, (it’s) very hard to forecast that", said Strautins.

Even though we can't control the weather, we can do our part to help limit water usage. In turn, that will reduce some of our dependence on the so far weak snow pack.