Weather brings winter curiosity

Saturday’s storm left a parting gift, dusting parts of La Cañada, La Crescenta and Burbank with snow and sending families streaming outdoors for some winter fun.

Jet Propulsion Laboratory climatologist Bill Patzert described the snowy weather as “more curiosity than catastrophe.

“The problem was that the rain, instead of arriving with the cold front, arrived in front of the cold front,” Patzert said. “So we got a little treat here and there but we didn’t get the real deal. But it’s fun.”

In the foothills, streets that have been plagued by evacuations during the Station fire and subsequent debris flows came alive as parents and children staged neighborhood snowball fights. Goss Canyon Avenue resident John Kornarens, who described his small dead-end street as “ground zero” during the 2009 Station fire, said it snows in La Crescenta every couple of years, but said the snow rarely sticks.

“We got snow last weekend but it wasn’t this much…Look at these beautiful fruit trees, they have snow on them,” he said gesturing to a grove of citrus trees dusted white.

His son, 13-year-old Stefan Kornarens, spent the afternoon throwing and dodging snowballs with his friends.

“It is pretty amazing,” Stefan said. “It is fun because we just get to run around and do crazy things. We tried to sled down the driveway but it didn’t really work.”

Denise Pearson, who has lived on Goss Canyon Avenue for 12 years, characterized snowfall in La Crescenta as a novelty. She called family in the Midwest to report the exciting news, but got a muted response.

“It is not very often, it is every two of three years,” Pearson said. “It has been a while since we have had it stay on the ground. Last week we had it, but it melted fast.”

The afternoon dusting followed on the heels of a strong rainstorm Friday night that dropped 2.4 inches of rain in the foothills and 1.2 inches in downtown Los Angeles, Patzert said. The most recent storm brought rainfall for the month of February to about average, he added.