Mitch Tobin, The Water Desk
Mitch Tobin is co-director of The Water Desk and a multimedia journalist based in southwest Colorado. A former newspaper reporter in Arizona and California, Mitch is the author of snow.news, a free newsletter about the science of snow and the state of the snowpack.
Climate change made the West’s snow drought far more likely—but it’s still not the...
Q&A with hydrologist Adrienne Marshall on why this past winter’s snowpack fell so low, how global warming increased the odds and what the future may hold
New website offers advice on drone photography
dronereporters.org offers practical guidance for journalists using drones in visual storytelling
Can AI forecast if snow will be fluffy or dense? Only with help from...
Scientists use machine learning and hand-collected data to better predict snowfall and storm impacts
Western U.S. snowpack is worth trillions of dollars
Putting a price tag on the water stored in the region’s high-elevation frozen reservoir
Scientists clash over how to track the West’s vital snowpack
Supporters of airborne snow surveys dispute “hotspots” study on water forecasts
In burned forests, the West’s snowpack is melting earlier
As blazes expand to higher elevations, the impacts cascade downstream
Human emissions are helping fuel the Southwest’s epic drought
Three studies of the Pacific Ocean conclude that lower precipitation isn’t just due to natural causes
When the West’s rivers surge each spring, older groundwater dominates the runoff
A better understanding of groundwater in the headwaters could improve streamflow predictions
Q&A: Snow droughts imperil the American West’s water supply
A lack of snow impacts the West’s water resources, wildfire risk, recreational activities and ecosystem health.
Scientists use cosmic rays to study the snowpack
Extraterrestrial particles offer insights into Earth’s mountain water towers