Another Powerful Storm Heads for State

SACRAMENTO —  Weather forecasters said Monday that a powerful storm system similar to the March “miracles” that helped ease drought conditions is heading toward California and will bring heavy rain and snow to critical watersheds by week’s end.

“I hope it materializes as strongly as (meteorologists) seem to think it will,” said Maurice D. Roos, chief hydrologist of the state Department of Water Resources, who stressed that as welcome as the storm would be, the extra precipitation would further soften the drought but not end it.

For California to get a significant boost out of this month’s weather patterns, precipitation in April--traditionally the tail of the rainy season--would have to be an unlikely 2 1/2 times normal, Roos said.

Meteorologist Steve Burback of WeatherData Inc., which provides forecasts for The Times, said a cold-weather system organizing in the Gulf of Alaska is expected to reach northwestern California tonight or Wednesday.

By Thursday afternoon, the expected storm should move farther south and bring “moderate to heavy rains with snow in the higher elevations, at least to start with,” Burback said.

“It appears that it is shifting back to the pattern that we had in March with lots of rain and snow,” Burback said.

In a related development, automatic precipitation sensors located at measuring sites throughout the northern watersheds and the Sierra Nevada recorded snow dustings and light rains on Monday, Roos said.

In the Southland, scattered rainshowers and cooler temperatures greeted morning commuters. Roos noted that the sensors, which measure the water content of snow, preliminarily showed the snowpack water content to be 72% of average in the mountains of California. The water content was a little heavier in the central and southern Sierra for this time of year and slightly lighter in the north, he said.

The water content of snow is an important ingredient of state and federal forecasts that are drawn up to indicate how much water will be available to Californians throughout the year.

Until the current round of measurements is completed, state officials said they could not increase deliveries of state water to contractors, such as the Metropolitan Water District.

Earlier, state officials had estimated that by April 1, State Water Project deliveries running at only 10% of normal--such as those to the MWD--could be increased to 20% of normal. An announcement of increases may come this week.