Wintery July scenes at Mt Baker

[Christy]

The highway dept spent the last 3 weeks clearing the road to Mt Baker (there are great trails in the area near the ski area) and the road will open tomorrow. It's kind of crazy the ski area closes mid April given all the snow they get but I know there are reasons. It's not unusual for it to be so snowy up there so late but I thought the pictures were cool enough to share. The DOT posts them on flickr.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/wsdot/sets/72157624451404810/

The roof of the restroom is peaking through the snow in the upper parking lot at Artist Point. The roof of the restroom is approximately 20 feet tall. July 26.

July 15.

Clearing switchbacks.

 

[skibum4ever]

Those pictures are amazing!!!

 

[Jilly]

All can I think of is that's JULY!! What was March like?

 

[RachelV]

Wow, those pics are unbelievable. I can't *believe* there's still so much snow up there! A-Basin and Alta were totally melted weeks ago:
https://www.arapahoebasin.com/ABasin/snow-conditions/web-cams.aspx
https://alta.com/pages/mtncam.php

And it looks like the road only goes to about 5000 ft? How much snow do they get up there?

 

[Christy]

How much snow do they get up there?

The ski area holds the world record for snow (95 feet during the 98-99 season). The Cascades get a lot of snow in general. But I don't know exactly why Baker gets so much and then melts out so late compared to elsewhere in the Cascades. NOAA has an explanation about the Cascades in general, but not really about Baker specifically. I wonder if it's because NO precip gets past the big volcanos--the south and west sides of Rainier get almost as snowy.

https://www.usatoday.com/weather/news/1999/wsnorcrd.htm

That was a La Nina year, like this one will be...

Jilly I think March was a bit below normal but it we had a cold spring and it snowed in the mts through June.