Winter Rite of Passage: Tioga Pass Prognosticator #12

[Southwest Dave]

It must have been the Spring contest you had entered Don. Time flies as they say ! Lol.

Don't forget to 'Ping the Poll" at the top of the thread to validate your entry.

[glc]

Hmmm - could this possibly be it? Tioga, Ebbetts, Sonora, and Monitor Passes have been closed by snow for about a week now.........

[Midwest Michael]

Hopefully they reopen it for a couple hours this afternoon, and then shut it down for the year!

[Southwest Dave]

Yep, Caltrans is listing the pass as closed right now and has been reported closed since Saturday on the Mono lake site. I missed this one, as I have been watching the Yosemite site which advises to call ahead. The reported snow depth is only around 6 inches with little accumulation forecast, but with the sub zero night time temps and barely above freezing daytime temps, I bet it's icy up there with it !!

From Sunday through next Weds the forecast suggests it will be more settled with sunshine, but with max temps only reaching around 40f, will it be enough to thaw it out before the next wintery system arrives ?

[Of course it is, it's not going to close until near the end of the month] ;-) Fingers crossed.

[glc]

Monitor Pass has reopened, but Tioga, Sonora, and Ebbetts are still closed. There is one announced winter closure out there - 203/Mammoth Lakes.

[Southwest Dave]

It looks lovely in Yosemite right now and a nice time to be visiting the valley, but way up high the temperatures are only just getting above freezing during the day and remaining well below freezing at night. Unless it warms enough to let the sun thaw out the ice and snow on the pass pretty soon, it might not re-open at all. I was thinking [hoping] that now was the time it may just get opened up again, but I'm not so sure now! [Still closed while typing this]

From Thurs night into Friday, snow and colder temps return to the high ground for the weekend which isn't going to help matters ! Only a light dusting is forecast, perhaps 3 to 4 inches of fresh snow, but added to the 8 inches plus reportedly settled at the moment, who knows ???

The view from Sentinel cam at just before 8am today.



Unofficially, I have seen reports that the last time it was open was on Fri 4th November.

[CAnative]

I knew predicting closure would be much harder but hadn't expected irony of road possibly opening on my predicted date. If the road doesn't reopen until spring then would the official closing date be Nov 3rd, the date formally announcing closure date, or some other date?

[Mark Sedenquist]

Hey, where the Proof of Fuel (POF) photo?

If the road doesn't reopen until spring then would the official closing date be Nov 3rd, the date formally announcing closure date, or some other date?

The official closing date is the OFFICIAL CLOSING DATE as determined by the NPS. This happens just about every year, the road will remain officially open but be, in fact, closed -- Until one day they'll update the site and tell us when they "officially" closed the road.

If you look at the past TPP winter closure reports Scroll down that page until you see the list of links -- you'll see that Sheriff Dave has to do a lot of monitoring...

Mark

[Southwest Dave]

Although they can be slow in confirming the actual closure date, the apparent slow response is mainly due to the fact that they have to be absolutely sure that there is no chance of it being re-opened. The present situation is a good example of this, where there is a reasonable chance of it happening, but the next big dumping of snow will almost certainly finalise it. Once that happens it's back to the date it was last closed which, as Mark mentioned, will be the date officially recognised by the Yosemite NPS site.

[Southwest Dave]

I do believe it's open !!

Quote from this morning.

Originally posted by me I was thinking [hoping] that now was the time it may just get opened up again, but I'm not so sure now!

O thee of little faith ! LOL

Game on !!!!