Colorado Daily Snow

Summary

On Sunday morning, most mountains are reporting a dusting to 3 inches of snow from showers on Saturday and Saturday evening. Look for similar amounts from Sunday morning through Sunday night as another weak system pushes showers over Colorado. After that, Monday through Wednesday will be dry, Thursday will be a transition day with cooler air and snow possible, then snow could continue through Friday.

Short Term Forecast

Recap: Saturday

Saturday was an ‘everything’ day. There was sunshine. There were clouds. There were snow showers. Official snow reports and snow stake cams show that these showers dropped anywhere from a dusting to 3 inches (at Cooper), and these amounts were about in line with expectations. Most of the showers ended by Saturday evening.

Sunday – Sunday Night

Sunday will be similar to Saturday, though the chance for a few inches of snow is a bit higher.

A weak storm will move across northern Utah and northern Colorado on Sunday and Sunday evening. As of early Sunday morning, radar shows precipitation over Utah and just getting into western Colorado.

Expect showers on Sunday lasting through about midnight Sunday night. Accumulations should be in the 1-3 inch range, slightly favoring the central and northern mountains.

Monday 3/25 – Wednesday 3/27

On Monday morning, you might see a few lingering clouds around the mountains, but these should dissipate quickly and most of the day will be mostly sunny and dry.

Tuesday and Wednesday will also be sunny and there will likely be more mid and high-level clouds filtering the sunshine. Temperatures on these days could be in the upper 30s to lower 40s and winds could be a little gusty in the afternoon as we’ll be ahead of the next storm that will be making landfall on the west coast.

Thursday 3/28 – Saturday 3/30

Unfortunately, the trend in most models is to weaken this storm. It still looks like we’ll see a cold front sometime on Thursday with snow from mid-Thursday or later Thursday through Friday. But with a weakening storm, I am lowering my expectations for snow amounts. The system is still 5-6 days away, so the forecasts will likely continue to change, and maybe the weakening trend could reverse.

Most forecast models show something like this map, below. Definitely a storm later in the weak, but I would want to see deeper blues and the black lines dipping further to the south to indicate a stronger system.

If things do come together, the best snow could be on Friday, March 29.

Extended Forecast

It looks like there will continue to be storms around the western US through early April, though right now I do not see any indications for major events.

It might be similar to what we’ve seen for the last few systems and the upcoming storm, with lighter snow and a few instances of deeper accumulations if things line up.

Bottom line – the weather should continue to be active with snow in the forecast, though snow amounts for each storm could be light.

Thanks for reading!

My next update will be on Monday morning.

JOEL GRATZ

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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