Summary

Snow should begin to fall on Sunday afternoon and will be accumulate the most through about Monday morning, with snow showers continuing through Tuesday morning. The deepest accumulations of 3-6+ inches will be in the northern mountains with a few inches making it to the central mountains. Monday morning will likely offer soft turns on groomers and north-facing slopes. Our next chance for snow will be from a quick storm on Thursday night. The long range forecast still looks drier than average through February, with snow picking up in early March.

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Details

The upcoming storm looks like it’s on track to bring the steadiest snow and most accumulations to the northern mountains from Sunday afternoon through about midday Monday.

The Sunday morning radar image snows that precipitation is falling to our northwest and is just getting to northern Utah at around 8am. This puts the snow on track to start in the northern mountains around early afternoon on Sunday.

Source: weatherbell.com

 

Most of the northern mountains should see a few inches of snow by Sunday evening, and then another few inches on Sunday night through Monday morning. Average accumulations by Monday morning will likely be in the 3-6 inch range, though it’s possible that we could touch double digits if especially heavy snow falls on a couple of mountains. Monday morning should offer pretty nice turns, though I would stick to the groomers and north-facing slopes as most south-facing slopes with have a hard crust under this new snow.

While the best accumulations will occur in the northern mountains, the central mountains could grab an inch or two (or three?) Sunday night into Monday. The snow may make it as far south as the northern San Juans, so Telluride and Silverton could also be clipped by some flakes.

From Monday mid morning through Tuesday morning, I think we’ll see lower snow accumulations than the previous 12-24 hours, but the northern mountains should still be able to grab a few more inches during this time. This should make for continued soft conditions on Tuesday morning.

The storm will be over on Tuesday morning, and then we’ll see plenty of sunshine on Tuesday and Wednesday, with mid-mountain temperatures on Wednesday likely rising into the 50s. It’ll be warm!

Our next chance for snow will be on Thursday night into Friday morning. Most mountains should measure 2-4 inches during this time, so there will likely be some fun action on the groomers for Friday morning with a bit of fresh on top of corduroy.

After that storm, I think we’ll be mostly dry through the rest of February. There could be a bit of snow next weekend (February 20-21) for the northern mountains, but at this point it doesn’t look like a big deal. The ridge over the west is forecast to hold for most of the last week of February, and this should reduce our chances for snow to a very low percentage.

The longer-range models still show a good picture for March with consistent storms beginning at the start of the month, but as I said a few days ago, ridges over the west tend to persist longer than the models think, so we may have to wait a bit longer than March 1st to see a switch in the pattern.

Happy Valentine’s Day and thanks for reading!

 

JOEL GRATZ

 

PS - Join me in Denver on Wednesday, February 17th. I’ll be giving a talk at the Arc’teryx Store (Cherry Creek area) and will cover the forecast for the rest of the winter, how to predict powder in each mountain range around Colorado, and the best websites and apps to help you track the weather. I might event throw in a few slides about how to find snow in Japan as I will just have returned from the trip:-) AND … for a small donation you’ll be able to drink beer from Avery Brewing! All of the donations will go to a charity founded in Colorado called SOS Outreach. PLUS … Arc’teryx will be giving away a free jacket. A pretty good way to spend a Wednesday night, eh? RSVP and see more details here: http://opsw.co/20qrD1E

 

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, Abasin, Winter Park, Berthoud Pass

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

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

Southern Mountains
Telluride, Silverton, Durango, Wolf Creek (Telluride and Silverton are on the northern side of the southern mountains)