WEBVTT FILE

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[off camera] NASA's been looking at snow from space for decades, but

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NASA is in the field right now to learn a little bit more. Here to tell us a little about it is Dr.

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Dalia Kirschbaum from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. Thank you for joining

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us. [Kirschbaum] Thanks for having me. [off camera] NASA satellites see snow cover from space

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how does this winter compare to previous years? [Kirschbaum] Well NASA's Earth observing

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fleet can look at everything - look at our oceans, our atmospheres

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and even over land where we can see snow. Now snow varies from year to year

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and month to month. And one interesting thing we've observed is

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out in the Sierra Nevadas. Two years ago we had snowpack that only one

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quarter of normal. Now compare it to this year, we see 180 percent

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of normal, the most in almost 20 years. And that's very important for understanding

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our freshwater resources. [off camera] NASA scientists are in the field right now,

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testing advanced technologies to measure snow like never before. What will

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these new measurements tell us about snow? [Kirschbaum] Well NASA's been observing snow cover

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from space for decades, but what we really want to understand is snow depth and how much

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fresh water is stored. And that helps us to understand and forecast rive flow

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and water availability. So a new snow campaign going on in Colorado

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called SnowEx uses advanced airborne instruments to measure

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these processes with the goal of ultimately putting this type of instrument on

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a future satellite to look at global snow depth around the world.

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[off camera] Can NASA see falling snow from space? [Kirschbaum] Yes.

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Snow is tricky to measure, but the Global Precipitation Measurement mission or GPM

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is specifically designed to look at snow layer by layer through the storm

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even at the tops of hurricanes. And that if very important for improving

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our weather forecasting and understand extreme events such as the one you see here

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from GPM in 2015, a Nor’easter that went on to

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effect New England. And having this vantage point of space is vital for

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understanding not just what's happening over land, but over areas we don't see

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much information from the ground such as over mountains and our oceans.

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[off camera] Up to 70 percent of water resources in the western U.S. comes from

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snowmelt. California has been getting heavy snow and rain recently. Is the drought

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over there? [Kirschbaum] Well these huge atmospheric rivers that are coming off the

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Pacific have dumped a tremendous amount of rainfall and snow at high altitudes in California

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and this has gone a long way in alleviating the drought conditions. But that's

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mostly at the surface. The groundwater takes a lot longer to replenish.

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and is critical for irrigation. And that will take several more years of

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an above average rainfall before it's back to normal. [off camera] How does snow

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impact parts of the country that rarely see any snowfall? [Kirschbaum] Well if you go to

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any grocery store, nearly half of the produce you see there actually came from the Central Valley

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of California. And the water used to irrigate those crops that

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originated for the most part in the Sierra Nevadas. So understanding how much snow

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we have there has wide-reaching implications across the U.S.

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affecting our produce. But that's only part of the story, a sixth of the world

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relies on season snowpack

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to better understand all of those processes from space.

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[off camera] Where can we learn more? [Kirschbaum] You can go to snow.nasa.gov where

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you can learn how NASA and its partners are uncovering advanced technologies to

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understand snow in our backyards and around the world. [off camera] Thanks for joining us.

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[Kirschbaum] Thanks for having me.