Colorado Daily Snow

Heads up, there may be fresher snow! Read the latest Colorado Daily Snow

By Joel Gratz, Founding Meteorologist Posted 1 year ago January 4, 2023

Storm ending, but more on the way

Summary

On Tuesday and Tuesday night, fluffy snow continued to fall across Colorado with 4-15 inches of accumulation, and this new snow should allow the soft/powder conditions to continue into Wednesday morning. Wednesday will bring lingering snow showers, Thursday will be dry, then the next storm should deliver 4-12 inches of snow from Friday morning through Saturday morning.

Short Term Forecast

On Tuesday and Tuesday night, plenty of moisture and lingering storm energy combined to produce 4-15 inches of snow across Colorado. Temperatures were cool, which led to the snow quality being pretty darn fluffy.

The deepest totals were around Irwin with 15+ inches, Winter Park with 10 inches, Aspen Mountain with 6 inches, Steamboat with 6 inches at mid-mountain and 12 inches at the summit, and likely 6+ inches around Wolf Creek.

Now on Wednesday, we will see snow showers continue, especially across the northern mountains, and there could be at least a few more inches of accumulation before the snow showers fall apart by later Wednesday afternoon.

Thursday should be a dry day with partly sunny skies. The exception could be around the northern mountains where there might be a few morning snow showers and lingering clouds throughout the day.

Then from Friday morning through Saturday morning, the next storm will bring snow to all mountains. The initial high-resolution forecast models for this storm are coming in around 4-12 inches with the most snow in the central and northern mountains.

During the day on Friday, a wind from the southwest will likely favor the southern mountains with potential soft conditions later in the day. Then on Friday night into Saturday morning, a wind from the west and eventually northwest should favor the northern and central mountains with a good chance for some powdery turns on Saturday morning's first chair.

Below is version #1 of the high-resolution OpenSnow forecast model for snowfall from Friday morning through Saturday afternoon.

And below is version #2 of the high-resolution OpenSnow forecast model for snowfall from Friday morning through Saturday afternoon.

Both of these models are based on different data, and when they agree (as they largely do above), we can have somewhat higher confidence in the snow forecast.

Extended Forecast

Following the storm on Friday into Saturday, we should see dry weather on Sunday, maybe a few snow showers on Monday (low confidence), then likely dry weather on Tuesday.

Our next chance for more significant snowfall will be around Wednesday, January 11 to Thursday, January 12. Most versions of most forecast models show this storm, but it's still one week away so it's a bit too soon to dig into the details.

Following the storm around January 11-12, we should see dry weather around January 13-14, then a stormy period will begin around January 15 or January 16 and will likely continue through the week of January 16th.

Even though the week of January 16th is about two weeks away, which often means we have low or no confidence in the forecast, when the average of ~100 combined versions of all three major global ensemble models (European, Canadian, American) show a stormy pattern, we can have decent confidence that this stormy pattern will happen, and that the middle of January will bring us a high chance for significant snowfall across the Rockies, which hopefully includes us here in Colorado.

Thanks for reading!

Joel Gratz

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Geography Key

Northern Mountains
Steamboat, Bluebird Backcountry, Granby, Beaver Creek, Vail, Ski Cooper, Copper, Breckenridge, Keystone, Loveland, Arapahoe Basin, 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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