This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
If you had suspicions it has been a very mild winter thus far for northern Utah — you're right.
The National Weather Service on Tuesday confirmed that is especially true for the Salt Lake Valley. While the Wasatch Mountains have been getting regular doses of snow, lower elevations have largely been dissed by Old Man Winter.
Forecasters note that total snowfall from Sept. 17 to January 17, the first four months of the typical snow season for Salt Lake City, was 6.8 inches — the seventh lowest mark for the capital since record-keeping began in 1885. The lowest ever was 1.4 inches, set in 1937-38. On average, Salt Lake City gets 25.8 inches during that snow period, with the highest mark being 75.7 inches 1992-93.
That dry trend continues well into the remainder of this week for the region's valleys. Salt Lake and Tooele counties, for example, looked for sunny skies and highs in the upper-30s on Wednesday, mirroring Tuesday's forecast; Thursday's weather will be warmer yet, near 40 degrees, and still no snow on the horizon.
It will be even drier and warmer in southern Utah, where a mix of sunny and partly cloudy skies will punctuate daytime highs in the low- to mid-50s through the midweek.
Monday's meager snowfall report from NWS' Salt Lake City office came just days after the National Oceanographic Atmospheric Association (NOAA) declared 2014 the warmest year globally on record. The same report noted that the year also was the fourth-warmest on record for Utah.
Over the past 40 years, the globe has been warming at a rate of about .29 degrees per decade. Utah? The state has warmed at 0.5 degrees, or 1.8 times the global average, according to Utah State Climatologist Robert Gillies.
"It's all connected, but plays out differently in different places in different years," Gillies says, comparing the science of climate change to a walk on the beach.
"There you are, watching the waves come in, tickling your toes," Gillies explained. "But every wave does not come as far up the beach as the last one. That's weather, that's what we call 'year to year variability.' "
While valley snow continues to be rare, the state's mountains have accumulated enough of the white stuff to warrant "moderate" risks for potentially deadly backcountry snowslides as of Tuesday, the Utah Avalanche Center warned.
The Utah Division of Air Quality, noting the lack of atmosphere-stirring storms, rated air quality for Wasatch Front counties Salt Lake, Weber, Cache, Davis and Utah, as well as eastern Utah's Duchesne County, at "moderate" through the midweek.
For more extensive forecast information, visit the Tribune's weather page at http://www.sltrib.com/weather.
Twitter: @remims