Colorado Daily Snow

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By Joel Gratz, Founding Meteorologist Posted 7 years ago September 26, 2016

Three storms possible in next 15 days

Summary

Sunny and dry on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. Then the pattern shifts a bit and showers are likely from Wednesday night through the weekend. Two cooler storms (rain and snow) are possible during the first week of October, and another storm could arrive beginning the following week.

Details

We had a beautiful weekend here in Colorado as the golden aspen leaves were out in all of their glory! Saturday was a chilly day (highs in the 30s at elevation) and snow showers fell over the northern half of the state. Sunday was a spectacular day with full sunshine and temperatures that were 5-10 degrees warmer than Saturday.

For the week coming up, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday will be glorious with sunny skies and temperatures warming about 5 degrees each day.

Then the pattern will shift just enough to allow moisture to push into Colorado starting on Wednesday night and continuing through the weekend. I don’t see any extended periods of heavy rain or snow during this time, but showers are likely each day and the snow level will likely stay above about 12,000-13,000 feet.

This week’s forecast is just the prelude to early October when all medium-range weather forecast models show a more active storm track developing over the western US.

I took at peek at the 15-day forecast from the Canadian model, and found that it shows three cold-ish storms impacting Colorado during the next 15 days.

The European and American weather models also show similar forecasts with two or three storms pushing through Colorado during the first 10-15 days of October, and each one of these storms would likely be cold enough to bring snow to elevations over 10,000 feet, and perhaps lower.

Of course, we cannot be confident in the exact track and timing of storms that are more than about 4-5 days away, so don’t lock in your early-season ski plans just yet:-)

I’ll let these models sort things out and write another update on Wednesday.

And now, it’s announcement time!

Heli Ski Event in Denver on October 6 - Movie, Beer, and Food

Join me in Denver on Thursday, October 6th to learn more about heli-skiing with Canadian Mountain Holidays (CMH). I'll talk about my previous trips with CMH, they will show a premiere of their new short film, and free beer and food will be served! This is always a fun event, so if you're interested in taking a heli ski trip this season or sometime soon, I hope you can make it! Please RSVP here: http://opsw.co/CMHDenverOct62016

New Hiking Weather App!

Last week, we launched “OpenSummit”, a new iPhone app that provides hourly forecasts for each 14,000 foot peak in Colorado, including the chance of lightning, precipitation, summit temperature, and summit wind speed. Download the app here: http://opsw.co/OpenSummitapp

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Thanks for reading and look for my next post on Wednesday, September 28th!

JOEL GRATZ

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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