Winter rains have already revived Tulare Lake in the Central Valley, but experts say it may grow to more than 200 miles as Sierra snow melts.
After a winter of prodigious rain and snow, California's water managers estimate the Sierra snowpack is sitting at around 300 percent of normal. As Spring temperatures begin to climb, the snow melt will begin to come down and flood to the tenuously full rivers and creeks feeding the lake and other parts of the valley. Sign up for NBC Bay Area’s Housing Deconstructed newsletter.
And yet the lake occasionally reappears in exceptionally wet years like 1969, 1983 and 1997. This year, the lake is expected to again inundate some 200 miles of farmland. It poses a deep economic hit to the valley economy as the lakebed is home to fifteen percent of the state's processed tomatoes, and half of the pima cotton crop.
At the edge of the lake, Carlos Hernandez looked out at massive expanses of water already languishing on some of the state’s most prized farm lands. Hernandez is a guard at nearby Corcoran Prison, which is already re-locating some prisoners because of flooding concerns. "That’s a huge lake in one sitting coming our way," said Tekoah Kadara as he looked toward the snowcapped Sierras, tossing sandbags into a neighbor's pickup truck.
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