A heavy snowstorm begins to batter the mountains around Lake Tahoe

A major snowstorm swept across the Sierra Nevada, including the Lake Tahoe area, on Friday, with as much as 10 feet of snow expected at higher elevations. Forecasters issued dire warnings about attempting to drive through gale-force winds and whiteout conditions, and Yosemite National Park was closed.

“Your safe travel period in the Sierra is over,” the National Weather Service in Reno, Nev., posted on social media. “It’s best to settle where you are.”

This is reported by the National Park Service that visitors who were already in Yosemite on Friday morning must leave before noon. Many ski resorts in the region announced they were closed that day.

One resort, Palisades Tahoe, posted on social media that it had seen “intense” snowfall and winds of 100 miles per hour. In videos posted by the resort, the ski lifts were faintly visible through a blanket of white, and the sky and ground were indistinguishable.

The resort, which was packed last weekend for a major ski race, had become “an absolute ghost town” by Friday, said Veronica Berkholtz, manager of the coffee shop at Palisades Tahoe.

Meteorologists began issuing rare alerts earlier this week about “life-threatening blizzard conditions” expected in the Sierra Nevada mountains, saying the approaching storm could drop more than a meter of snow through Sunday.

On Friday, forecasters said backcountry avalanche danger was likely to be “high to extreme” for the Central Sierra, the heart of the vast and diverse mountain range that runs along California’s spine.

Forecasters reserve snow warnings like Friday’s only for the heaviest snowstorms. The National Weather Service in Reno has issued just eight snowstorm warnings in the past 12 years.

Almost exactly a year ago, a powerful snowstorm dumped more than two feet of snow on the Lake Tahoe area in less than a day. The snow piled up so thickly on the roofs that when another storm threatened more snow and rain, residents had to rush to shovel off enough weight to keep their roofs from collapsing.

The same storm system took officials and residents of Southern California’s San Bernardino Mountains by surprise, leaving people trapped for days in homes buried up to the eaves in snow.

In the communities around Lake Tahoe, residents and business owners say they know how to prepare for a lot of snow.

“It becomes part of the winter experience,” said Heather Svahn, president of Mountain Hardware & Sports, a store in Truckee, California, that sells fishing tackle, shovels and power tools, among other things.

Ms Svahn said the store has arranged for extra supplies to be delivered earlier in the week to avoid the most treacherous travel periods. Residents have gone into the store, she said, to buy shovels and shear pins, special bolts for snow blowers that are prone to breaking if the machines are used in heavy, wet snow conditions.

Not much snow had fallen in Truckee yet, she said Friday morning, but she knew it was coming.

“It’s only a matter of time,” Ms. Svahn said, before the snowstorm swept over the mountain peaks to the west and reached the city.

Shannon Parrish, the owner of Grocery Outlet, which has stores in Truckee and Incline Village, Nev., said both stores were open Friday morning, but the situation could change quickly. Deliveries for Friday and Saturday were canceled, she said, and workers commuting from Reno were told to stay home.

Mrs. Parrish, who lives in Truckee, said eight to nine inches of snow fell at her home Thursday evening.

“It’s really quiet,” she said. “I think people are willing to wait for it.”