Rare May Winter Weather Warning Issued for California

As spring blooms across much of California, mountainous areas in the state's northern region have been plunged back into winter weather over the weekend.

Some 31 inches of snow fell down near the top of Mount Lassen between Saturday and Sunday, according to the Sacramento branch of the National Weather Service (NWS). Footage shared on social media shows vehicles driving carefully on the snowy roads of Nevada County, California, after a late-season storm caused spinouts and collisions on Interstate 80 and forced a stretch of the road to close down for several hours on Saturday.

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Around 8:45 p.m. on Saturday night, eastbound traffic on the highway was released with chain controls in place from Alta to the Nevada state line, as reported by CBS News. Westbound traffic was released in Truckee a little later, by 11 p.m., also with chain controls. The interstate was closed from Truckee to the state line.

On Sunday morning, the highway was reopened without chain restrictions, as weather forecasts say the area can expect spring-like weather this week.

Snow also fell in part of Sacramento County over the weekend. Footage by the Folsom Police Department shared on social media shows a police dog running in the snow in Folsom, California.

The Palisades Tahoe ski resort wrote on X, formerly Twitter, that the venue recorded 26 inches of snow in 24 hours. The team described the past weekend as "one of the best May powder days in recent memory."

Elevations above 5000' along the Sierra were under a winter storm warning between Saturday morning and Sunday morning, though the NWS urged drivers on Monday to still exercise caution at the wheel as the roads will remain slick throughout the day.

The region was also hit by steady rain over the weekend. Several cities in Northern California saw a record amount of rainfall on May 4, according to the NWS. Redding, in Shasta County, received 1.47 inches of rain—the highest amount since May 4, 1951. Stockton, in San Joaquin County, received a record half-inch on Saturday—another record, according to the Sacramento Bee.

Modesto, in Stanislaus County, received more than three-quarters of an inch of rain on Saturday, breaking a record set in May 1932. Two-thirds of an inch fell in downtown Sacramento, according to the newspaper.

More bad weather is expected in Northern California today, with the NWS Weather Prediction Center warning that showers and thunderstorms over the Pacific Northwest will move eastward to the Northern Intermountain Region and into Central California by late Monday afternoon.

The weather will improve on Tuesday morning, while showers and thunderstorms will move southeastward to the Southern Plains and Southern Rockies, "linking up with the front and extending westward over the Ohio Valley by Tuesday afternoon," the NWS said.