Highways, ski areas shut down

Tom Gardner

Friday, Jan. 2, 2004 | 11:21 a.m.

RENO -- A potent winter storm swept into the Sierra Nevada just hours into the new year, shutting down the main highways linking Northern California and Nevada and giving ski areas more weather than they could handle.

The forecast called for at least a chance of snow into Saturday along with temperatures ranging from lows in the teens and 20s to highs in the 30s and low 40s.

"It is wild up here," Alpine Meadows spokeswoman Rachael Woods said after the resort on Lake Tahoe's northwest shore surrendered for the day as winds topped 120 mph. "I just hope I can get home."

She said Alpine had picked up 14 inches of snow by midafternoon with more still falling heavily.

"When this storm decides to mosey on, we're going to have the powder day of a lifetime here," she said.

A winter storm warning remained in effect for the Tahoe Basin, where a combination of heavy snow and winds shut down Interstate 80 for a 73-mile stretch west of the California-Nevada line most of the day.

It reopened late Thursday with chains mandatory over Donner Summit.

U.S. 50 south of Lake Tahoe was closed intermittently for avalanche control, with chains mandatory for 42 miles west of the state line when it was open.

A westbound Amtrak train was stopped 37 miles west of Truckee, Calif., when three axles derailed on two passenger cars of the California Zephyr, according to spokesman Dan Stessel.

He said there were no injuries among the 300 passengers and crew of 15 and the train had heat and power as well as food and water. Crews from Union Pacific Railroad, which owns the tracks, were working to get the Zephyr back on the way to Emeryville, Calif.

Stessel said the cause was not known, but it was snowing heavily and an eastbound "spreader" engine used to clear snow from the tracks had passed the derailment site a short time earlier, possibly scooping snow onto the westbound track.

In Washington state, blowing snow caused hazardous driving conditions in the southeast. Yakima reported 5.4 inches of snow Thursday, breaking the previous daily record of 3.2 inches from 1956.

In Oregon, about 6 inches of snow fell in Portland, Eugene and Salem. At the height of the storm, drivers were required to use chains the state's segment of Interstate 5. About 3,000 Pacific Power customers lost electrical service.Elsewhere in the Sierra, chains or snow tires were mandatory on highways that weren't closed by the drifting snow or for avalanche control.

Measurements today by the California Department of Water Resources put the snow depth at Echo Summit, 25 miles south of Alpine Meadows, at 130 percent of average for this time of year.

On Thursday Woods said Alpine was at 160 percent of average with 167 inches of snow at its base lodge and 234 inches at its 7,500-foot midmountain level.

Despite having to close on New Year's Day, she said the storm was a good investment.

"It's a price you have to pay to get this amount of snow," she said.

"If it didn't snow again, we'd have enough snow to cover us for the season."

The storm snarled traffic from the Sierra to the Utah line, dropping a mixture of rain and snow in western Nevada that prompted chain or snow tire requirements on U.S. 395 from the northern California line through Reno, Carson City and Minden to the southern California line.

The Mount Rose highway over the Sierra south of Reno was closed by snow and spinouts.

"We're going to wait here and play in the snow 'til the roads open and we're going home," Lemo Bershell said as he waited to return to Oakland, Calif.

The eastern part of the state was under a blowing snow advisory late Thursday with chains or snow tires required on Interstate-80 and U.S. 50 over the summits and on connecting highways including U.S. 93 north and south of I-80.

The potent Pacific storm, the second to strike the region in four days, dumped up to 3 inches of rain in many areas, sending water and mud flowing from swollen creeks and onto streets and sidewalks.

Before the storm moved south late in the afternoon, saturated ground in Santa Cruz County gave way and washed out a section of a Highway 17, the mountain route connecting Santa Cruz to San Jose.

Snow also closed Interstate 5 in the far north of the state for several hours Thursday morning, as whiteout conditions hit an approximately 90 mile stretch of road between Redding and Yreka. It was the third time this week that snow shut the highway.

About 217,000 Pacific Gas and Electric Co. customers were without power at some point during the day, the utility said, as heavy wind and toppled trees downed power lines.