I am going to start posting the Colorado Daily Snow a few times a week.

We are still about 55-70 days from any lifts starting to spin, but it’ll be fun to start looking at weather systems and picking out anything noteworthy that’s heading toward Colorado.

First flakes

The cool storm over this past weekend (August 18-19) brought a few flakes to the higher elevations of Northern Colorado.

There was a comment in my previous post that the summit of the 14,265-foot Quandary Peak (just south of Breckenridge) received a dusting of snow.

Also, on Sunday, I saw a dusting of snow near of the summits of Longs Peak and Mount Meeker on the southern end of Rocky Mountain National Park.

It’s normal for flakes to fall on the highest peaks in late August and early September. That said, I do not see any cold storms heading toward Colorado for the next week at least, so there is little hope for significant snow for a while.

Smoke

The visible satellite image on Monday (August 20) shows the haze over eastern Colorado, which is smoke from wildfires across the western US.

The HRRR Smoke model illustrates that Colorado is not the only place dealing with smoke. There is a lot of it across the country! The colors below show total smoke in the atmosphere, from the ground up to the altitude of commercial aircraft.

The good news is that this same model shows less smoke on Tuesday afternoon and evening.

As fires continue to burn across the western US, expect more times of smoke throughout August and September.

With luck, the fire intensity will decrease and the wind direction will keep smoke away from Colorado, but neither of those are guarantees.

It’s a bummer to have our clear blue skies turn milky white with the smokey haze in the air, but that’s the hand that we are being dealt.

Moisture

We are dry on Monday, August 20th.

However, a surge of moisture from the southwest will hit Colorado on Tuesday evening through Wednesday, so expect widespread rain during this time. As always, we’ll take the moisture whenever we can get it!

Most models show drier weather on Thursday and Friday, but there could be enough moisture for a few showers to hang around.

OpenSummit

If you want detailed weather forecasts for your summer and fall hiking, biking, and climbing adventures, please download the newest update to our OpenSummit app.

Download OpenSummit (iPhone only)

We just released an update that increases the number of mountains from only the Colorado 14ers to about 1,000 of the highest and/or notable summits and hiking areas across the country.

People often ask me what I do in the summer. In addition to working on features for OpenSnow for next season, the team and I spend considerable time improving and expanding OpenSummit. Thanks for checking it out!

Thanks for reading!

JOEL GRATZ

Vail Prize Raffle

A friend of mine helps to run the Vail Symposium, which hosts community events with expert speakers throughout the year. Their annual fundraising raffle is going on now and the grand prize package is a seven-day luxury stay in Vail. I thought this might be an enticing prize for the OpenSnow community, something you could win for yourself or give away to family or friends. Here’s the link for more information: https://go.rallyup.com/vailvacation

Geography Key

Northern Mountains
Steamboat, Granby, Beaver Creek, Vail, Ski Cooper, Copper, Breckenridge, Keystone, Loveland, Abasin, Winter Park, Berthoud Pass, Eldora, Rocky Mountain National Park, Cameron Pass

Along the Divide
Loveland, Arapahoe Basin, Winter Park, Berthoud Pass

East of the Divide
Eldora, Echo, Rocky Mountain National Park, Cameron Pass

Central Mountains
Aspen, Sunlight, Monarch, Crested Butte, Irwin, Powderhorn

Southern Mountains
Telluride, Silverton – north side of the southern mountains | Purgatory, Wolf Creek – south side of the southern mountains