The good news for Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday is that we’ll be largely free of rain and free of smoke. Enjoy!

My last update on Monday talked about how we’d likely see dry weather for at least the early part of the Labor Day weekend with a chance for some precipitation around Labor Day.

The newest models are now trending toward moisture increasing as early as Saturday, with the potential for deep moisture to hang around Colorado through a lot of next week. This is a big change from the previous forecast and something to keep an eye on.

The major models are still changing run-to-run (every 12 hours or so), so it’s too early to have much confidence in the exact track and timing of the moisture.

For example, the forecast made yesterday for total precipitation from August 29 – September 7 showed that the most precipitation would stay just to the east of Colorado.

A new forecast, made today, shifts the precipitation west so that 2/3rds of Colorado could see a lot of rain (1+ inches).

As is often the case, we are right on the edge. A slight shift east and the moisture will mostly miss Colorado. A slight shift west and a lot of our state will see a lot of rain.

During next week's precipitation, temperatures will be cold enough, especially at night, that we could see snow accumulate above about 13,000 feet. This isn’t unusual for early September and doesn’t tell us much about the snow season ahead, but it would be fun to see more snow on the peaks!

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 Colorado 14ers to about 1,000 of the highest and/or notable summits and hiking areas across the country.

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

Thanks for reading … next update on Friday, August 30.

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 in Colorado. 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