Capitol Weekly Podcast: Chris Orrock and the Sierra snowpack

This time around, there’s great news: California has seen a succession of heavy storms – and now boasts a historic snowpack. This week’s snow measurement at Phillips Station, a site 8,000 feet up in the Sierra near Lake Tahoe, shows a snowpack more than 160% of the norm.

And that brings us to Chris Orrock of the California Department of Water Resources. Chris joins the podcast to chat with John Howard and Tim Foster about what this wealth of snow means for California’s water reserves and flood dangers, and the implications for wildfires later in the year.

Each month during the wet season, California officials head into the Sierra Nevada to measure the snowpack — a critical index of the state’s water supply.