Cool spring is maintaining mountain snowpack

A cool spring in Northwest Montana has kept an above average snowpack clinging to the mountains, yet the potential for local flooding remains unlikely.

“Cold temperatures have shut down the snow melt that typically happens this time of year,” said Ray Nickless, a hydrologist with the National Weather Service.

Temperatures have been 3 to 6 degrees below average for April.

“[Snow] should be melting by now, but it’s just sitting there with the cold weather we’ve had,” he said. “Plus, we had a pretty decent snowstorm last week.”

Current snowpack levels in the mountains around the Flathead are at 116 percent of average. The snow stake at the summit of Big Mountain still shows more than 100 inches, while a SNOTEL site on Flattop Mountain in Glacier National Park shows 130 inches.

Nickless says rivers in the Flathead River drainage could reach above-average flows when the snow finally begins to melt.

“I think it will be running good and high, and the kicker will be whether we get lasting warm temperatures,” he said.

He adds that there is always potential for spring flooding if heavy rains set up, “but for most part, there isn’t a real big concern for flood potential.”

The weather outlook for May is for near normal temperatures with a slight chance of below normal precipitation.