Yosemite National Park — Frank Gehrke, right, chief of the California Cooperative Snow Surveys Program, and Vince White, a hydrographer with Southern California Edison, weigh a sample of snow to calculate the water content and depth of the lingering huge snowpack at Dana Meadows, near the Tioga Pass area of the Eastern Sierra. The Department of Water Resources normally has stopped taking snowpack measurements this time of year. Their measurements and snow pillow sensors determine how water reservoirs manage their water content.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times

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Yosemite National Park — Workers remove snow from the roof of the Tioga Pass Resort, not far from the entrance to Yosemite National Park. The first week of June in California, snow depths of 7 feet or more were not uncommon at high elevations.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times

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Yosemite National Park — Frank Gehrke, left, chief of the California Cooperative Snow Surveys Program, watches as Vince White, a hydrographer with Southern California Edison, pushes a long pole into the snowpack to record the snow depth and then weigh the snow core for water content. From that, hydrologists can calculate the volume of melt and runoff that fill the state’s reservoirs and aqueducts.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times

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Yosemite National Park — The Tioga Pass Resort sign is nearly buried in snow. This year’s early spring snowpack in the Sierra was the fifth-largest in the last 60 years. A cool, cloudy May delayed its melt, and this month has been similar thus far — at some upper elevations, more snow has fallen.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times

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Yosemite National Park — Frank Gehrke, chief of the California Cooperative Snow Surveys Program, takes notes after weighing a sample of snow. He has been taking such surveys for 30 years, 24 of them for the state.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times

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Yosemite National Park CA, USA — Snow surrounds the closed Tioga Pass Entrance Station, elevation 9,943 feet. Tioga Pass serves as the eastern entry point for Yosemite National Park and is the highest highway pass in California and in the Sierra Nevada. The pass is subject to winter closure because of high snowfall.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times

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Yosemite National Park — On a recent sunny morning, Frank Gehrke, right, chief of the California Cooperative Snow Surveys Program, and Vince White, a hydrographer with Southern California Edison, ski over the snowpack at Dana Meadows in Yosemite National Park. Their measurements determined that the snowpack had enough water to form a 3-foot-deep lake.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times

http://framework.latimes.com/?attachment_id=33569

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