{"id":429466,"date":"2026-03-04T10:34:38","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T09:34:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=429466"},"modified":"2026-03-04T10:34:40","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T09:34:40","slug":"media-say-climate-change-caused-the-deadly-lake-tahoe-avalanche-theyre-wrong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=429466","title":{"rendered":"Media Say \u2018Climate Change\u2019 Caused the Deadly Lake Tahoe Avalanche. They\u2019re Wrong."},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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From Climate Realism<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Anthony Watts<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

On February 17, 2026, an avalanche struck north of Lake Tahoe, California, killing nine people amid a heavy, multi-day snowstorm in the area. The media falsely blamed climate change for the event. Heavy snow is common in the mountains above Lake Tahoe during the winter as are avalanches. Sadly, deaths from avalanches are all too common as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multiple media outlets jumped on the \u201cclimate change caused the deadly avalanche\u201d bandwagon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, Scientific American\u2019s headline about the avalanche was titled, \u201cLake Tahoe avalanche explained by warm weather | Scientific American<\/strong><\/a>,\u201c In making a false causal connection between climate change and the avalanche, Scientific American wrote, \u201cMany scientists expect rising temperatures from climate change to increase dangerous avalanches\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAvalanche risks remain high in California after deaths of skiers,\u201d <\/strong><\/a>was the title of The Guardian<\/em>\u2019s story on the sad event, blaming the deaths on the \u201cclimate crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While NPR\u2019s article about the avalanche asked, \u201cDid climate change factor into the Lake Tahoe avalanche?, <\/strong><\/a> <\/strong>stating, \u201c[a]s the climate warms, scientists are trying to better understand avalanche risks.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The media response to California\u2019s recent deadly avalanche is laid out plainly: weather was rebranded as climate crisis to support a narrative; yet no such connection between climate change and the recent avalanche exists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scientific American, The Guardian, NPR, and other media outlets, in a unified rapid response, framed the tragedy through the lens of global warming. The claim, implicit or explicit, is that rising temperatures and so-called \u201csnow droughts\u201d made the avalanche more likely. That framing is false, representing the media\u2019s attempt to follow the example of flawed attribution studies that Climate Realism<\/em> has debunked multiple times<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Avalanches are weather-driven events governed by snowpack structure, storm timing, temperature swings, and terrain. The media have presented no evidence of a long-term trend of increasing incidences of avalanches because no such trend exists. Absent such a trend, the Lake Tahoe avalanche can\u2019t be honestly attributed to climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The mainstream media lurch back and forth between differing claims about the prevalence and amount of snowfall the world can expect under global warming: from claims of snow disappearing to worsening snowstorms. For years, we have been told snowfall is disappearing, that warming winters mean the end of ski seasons, and that snow will soon be a relic. Yet heavy snow years continue to occur. The Sierra Nevada experienced record-breaking snowfall in the winter of 2016\u20132017, a season documented by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration<\/a>\u2019s (NOAA) station data. Snow in Sierra Nevada is not an anomaly. It is the norm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

NOAA\u2019s long-term 1991\u20132020 climate normals for Truckee, California \u2014 available through NOAA\u2019s U.S. Climate Normals dataset<\/a> \u2014 show average January and February high temperatures in the low 40s Fahrenheit and lows well below freezing. That is a prime snow conditions period. Calling February snowfall delayed by a few weeks a \u201csnow drought\u201d ignores both climatology and history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

California gets snow every year. Some years, storms arrive early. Some years, they arrive late. That variability is precisely why climate is defined using 30-year baselines rather than single months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Avalanches in the area are not new phenomena. For example, the March 31, 1982 Alpine Meadows avalanche near Lake Tahoe<\/a> killed seven people, more than 40 years of climate change ago, when the average global temperatures was cooler. That event is further documented in historical reporting from the era and summarized in newspaper archival coverage<\/a>, and the San Francisco Gate even made the comparison between the current avalanche and the 1982 event<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Avalanches require a very specific set of ingredients that have nothing to do with climate. According to the National Weather Service<\/a> (NWS) and Powder Magazine<\/em><\/a>, here are the key ingredients for a snow avalanche:<\/p>\n\n\n\n