Colorado Daily Snow
By Joel Gratz, Founding Meteorologist Posted 5 years ago November 6, 2018
It’s not (quite) over
Summary
On Monday and Monday night, an additional 2-6 inches of snow accumulated in a few northern mountains and we should see clouds and light snow continue through Wednesday morning. Speaking of Wednesday, a few resorts just announced that they will open on Wednesday, earlier than expected. For upcoming weather, we could see light snow on Thursday and Sunday but neither storm looks strong. Both of those days will be 5-10 degrees cooler than previous days.
Short Term Forecast
Recap of Monday and Monday night
Following the 5-15 inches of snow that fell in the central and northern mountains on Sunday and Sunday night, moisture hung around the northern mountains on Monday and Monday night resulting in additional snow accumulations.
The graphic below shows the moisture hanging around Berthoud Pass, near Winter Park along the northern divide. I accidentally did NOT post this graphic yesterday and instead posted the same picture twice. Sorry!
The bottom of the graphic is the ground, the elevation is listed on the left, and time goes from the right (Monday) to the left (Wednesday). Green shows more moisture and orange shows little moisture.
Notice that the moisture is shallow, only up to ~16,000 feet on average. This is just enough moisture to keep clouds around and periods of light snow with a few bursts of intense snow as cells move by.
Following the snow on Sunday night, and the light snow showers on Monday, the skiing was fantastic on Monday morning and midday. Here are a few pictures I took at Berthoud Pass.
A solid pow day.
A local in her element.
A lot of you sent me pictures of powder during the last few days and I will post them over the next few days to keep the stoke alive!
Moving on, the shallow moisture that hung over the northern mountains provided additional snow accumulation on Monday afternoon and Monday night.
Below are the snow totals from Monday morning through Tuesday morning. Roughly half the snow fell on Monday afternoon and half fell on Monday night. The deepest totals were in the highest mountains close to the divide.
Arapahoe Basin - 6”
Keystone - 6”
Loveland - 6”
Breckenridge - 5”
Steamboat - 4”
Winter Park - 4”
Copper - 2”
Vail - 2”
While the models did a good job of showing the ingredients that would produce this snow on Monday and Monday night (jet stream overhead, vorticity (storm energy), enough moisture near the ground, some instability), the models did NOT do a good job predicting up to 6 inches. We talked about an additional few inches of accumulation, but the 6-inch reports near the divide were a bit higher than I expected for a 24-hour total.
To illustrate how poorly the models are performing when it comes to precipitation prediction, below is the forecasted radar for Tuesday at 2 am. This forecast was produced only 3 hours before 2 am and generally was correct in showing some precipitation over the northern mountains (see the blue color around Keystone, Arapahoe Basin, Loveland, Berthoud Pass, Steamboat).
While the 3-hour forecast above got it right, the 9-hour forecast below got it wrong.
In other words, the last forecast most of us would have looked at before going to bed, updated at about 7 pm on Monday night, showed much lighter precipitation over the northern mountains for Tuesday at 2 am.
Put another way, sure, the forecast that came out just a few hours before the more intense overnight snow got it right, but the useful forecasts that came out 9+ hours before the overnight snow got it wrong. Ugh!
We’ll keep chugging along, looking at the ingredients that lead to the snowfall and seeing if we can figure out these events.
Tuesday and Tuesday night
Expect clouds and light snow showers to continue over the northern mountains. A final push of energy through Tuesday night might bring another few inches of snow, and this energy could be a hair further north and focus on Steamboat and Cameron Pass and might be weaker near the I-70 mountains. We’ll see.
Wednesday
Looks dry and mostly sunny with even some sun over the northern mountains as the low-level moisture breaks up.
Thursday
A weak storm will brush by northern and eastern Colorado. The northern mountains could see anything from a dusting to maybe 2-3 inches.
The bigger impact will be cooling temperatures as readings should be 5-10 degrees lower than Wednesday.
Friday and Saturday
Friday will start chilly but both days will be dry with plenty of sunshine.
What mountains are open?
Arapahoe Basin - open every day
Breckenridge - open starting on Wednesday 11/7
Eldora - open starting on Wednesday 11/7
Keystone - open starting on Wednesday 11/7
Loveland - open every day
Wolf Creek - open Friday 11/9 and every day after (not just weekends)
Backcountry - lots of snow, lots of wind = avalanche risk, please make good decisions and check the avalanche forecasts from CAIC.
Extended Forecast
Sunday, November 11
Likely another storm similar to the one on Thursday, November 8th, with just light snow over the northern mountains and cold temperatures across the state.
Beyond
Next week looks mostly dry at the moment with low confidence in any significant storms. But our snowpack is well above average and the low sun angle of November will allow this snow to stick around, so our early season is off to a good start!
My next update will be on Wednesday, November 7.
JOEL GRATZ
Announcements
My upcoming presentations about the winter forecast and tips for chasing pow!
* Thursday, November 8 in Evergreen at Boone Mountain Sports / Evergreen Brewery. Free to attend. Beer and food available for purchase, and the talk starts at 7 pm. Details here.
* Update Location! Friday, November 9 in Breckenridge at the Riverwalk Center. Party, my talk, and a movie. Time from 500-830pm. Please get your free ticket here.
* November 28 in Vail.
* December 5 in Denver.
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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
About Our Forecaster
Joel Gratz
Founding Meteorologist
Joel Gratz is the Founding Meteorologist of OpenSnow and has lived in Boulder, Colorado since 2003. Before moving to Colorado, he spent his childhood as a (not very fast) ski racer in eastern Pennsylvania.
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