Recent snow photos plus an early October storm?

US and Canada Daily Snow

Heads up, there may be fresher snow! Read the latest US and Canada Daily Snow

By Joel Gratz, Founding Meteorologist Posted 6 years ago September 23, 2018

Summary

Western Canada continued to receive high-elevation snow during the past week, and this trend should hold for the next week as well. Looking ahead to early October, there are hints that many areas of the western United States could see their first snow accumulations of the season.

Short Term Forecast

Looking at snowy scenes never gets old, so let’s check out a few more from this week.

Marmot Basin in Alberta Canada. Hey, winter!

Revelstoke in British Columbia, Canada. A solid coating of snow up high.

These snowy webcam images are exciting, though it's not unusual to see snow blanket the higher mountains of western North America in late fall. For proof, look at these pictures from last year at this time (September 23, 2017) following a significant storm that dropped snow on the central and northern Rockies.

Looking ahead to the next 10 days, will we see a repeat of last year with widespread snow over the United States? Nope.

The temperature forecast for the five days from September 23-27 shows that the best chance for colder-than-average temperatures will be near and east of the divide over the Northern Rockies.

And the temperature forecast for the following five days from September 28 to October 2 shows that the same pattern will continue, and perhaps become even stronger, with readings of 10C / 18F colder than average over the plains of Canada and eastern Montana.

Since the snow often follows the cold air, it’s no surprise that the 10-day snow forecast (below) shows that the best chance for snow will be near and east of the divide over Canada and northern Montana.

Extended Forecast

The 10-15 forecast, out to October 3-7, is where things might be a bit more interesting for the western United States.

The temperature forecast below, which is created from an average of 51 models, shows cold air hanging on near and east of the divide, AND is shows cooler-than-average temperatures over the western United States.

This is a reasonably strong hint that we might see a storm or two over the western US during the first 10 days of October. And if the timing of the precipitation coincides with the cooler air, many mountains could see a coating of snow over the higher elevations.

Since it is still fall, and it’ll be another month at the earliest before we have a chance to ski, the most we can do now is hope to see some flakes to get us excited for the season.

I’ll be back on September 30 with the next update.

Thanks for reading!

JOEL GRATZ