Denver LACK OF snow/winter thread

[PTPatrick]

Was a little disappointed this AM. It was snowing and all the sudden turned to rain about 10;00. It melted a little of what accumulated. But the band that rolled through from about 3:00-7:00 made up for it. Last time I saw flakes that big was blizzard 06. We got about 6 inches in that period of time here downtown, but some of that is already compacting again. Shoveled a bit and even the little that we had was back breaking.

Will be interesting to see what happens tonight. Next round is now coming up from the palmer divide.

[SCMedic]

You're telling me Patrick. I was dissapointed when I woke up to rain, then got excited when it changed, then it quickly changed back to rain/sleet for most of my day here in Erie. 2 miles down the road, and downhill for that matter, it was snowing. Weird event for me really. 32 and raining for most of the afternoon.

Changed to snow around 5:30 and came down big and heavy for a couple hours. Dry slot now, but hopefully it'll fill back in soon. Hope the event isn't over.

[solarlux]

Hey, hailing in at 6000 ft on the ridge south in Highlands Ranch. It's been hanging at 31-32F all day here. Started with a little snow in the morning, had perhaps 4" by noon. After that, some snow/rain mix hit, adding a new layer of slush. Then with the late aftenoon squalls, another 5" came down. With some additional snow in the early evening, I think we're at about a foot now.

We're in the dry slot too now, but it looks like another wave is coming.

I just glanced at the current NAM 500 mb plot, and wow, there's three large concentric circles that stretch from Montana down to Texas. Now that is a system!

I heard that Estes Park is already over 30" and I-70 is closed from Morrison to Vail. Someone in the region will probably top 4' before this over. Not bad at all!

The 00z NAM appears to softening the precip levels from the system back-side (perhaps another .5" liquid), but it's been a fun storm for mid-April.

[PTPatrick]

In watching the satellite and radar echos...one would think that our wind is still coming form the east or even southeast...like the low is still south of us. actually on satellite looks like low is somewhere south of Pueblo. Seem like when the surface low gets into NE NM/OK panhandle/Western Kansas, the winds should be more NE. In typical NE upslope events we dont normally get waves of precip from the SE like this...normally you see a radar echo that covers the metro and foothill when the wind is NE that is more stratiform and less convective. The relative lack of accumulation in the Palmer Divide compared to foothils(and even southern Foothills like south park) would also suggest the real NE upslope aint here yet and that most oftoday was more Easterly upslope.

[SCMedic]

In watching the satellite and radar echos...one would think that our wind is still coming form the east or even southeast...like the low is still south of us. actually on satellite looks like low is somewhere south of Pueblo. Seem like when the surface low gets into NE NM/OK panhandle/Western Kansas, the winds should be more NE. In typical NE upslope events we dont normally get waves of precip from the SE like this...normally you see a radar echo that covers the metro and foothill when the wind is NE that is more stratiform and less convective. The relative lack of accumulation in the Palmer Divide compared to foothils(and even southern Foothills like south park) would also suggest the real NE upslope aint here yet and that most oftoday was more Easterly upslope.

I had some similar thoughts earlier today, while noticing the convective nature and squalls. Makes you wonder what late tonight has in store. If we can get a true NE upslope going, we could add some big numbers. Too bad temps aren't down 2 or 3 degrees. Being on the cusp isn't much fun.

[solarlux]

Interesting points regarding the low interactions.

I see the RUC is now showing precip from the NE through many of the night hrs. It's too bad the NAM temp guidance didn't pan out or we would've seen better widespread totals. Hopefully it'll cool down a few degrees overnight.

[Dencolo]

Below is the heaviest storm total I found as of last night, in Pinecliffe which is just shy of Nederland. I've probably received well over a foot of snow, but only have about 5" on the ground. That is becuase the rain squalls that moved in really took away a lot of the snow.


1051 PM HEAVY SNOW 3 SE PINECLIFFE 39.90N 105.39W
04/17/2009 M42.6 INCH JEFFERSON CO TRAINED SPOTTER

[PTPatrick]

I didnt get near a foot at any given time. I think the most I ever had on the ground would have been about 6 inches last night after the big burst of snow. But that was even down to 3-4 inches by bedtime. It was snowing at 6:00 this morning but didnt appear to be accumulating. And then it apparently turned to rain. Either way, never did get much accumulation. This is the sloppiest snow I have ever seen. Kinda bums me out that I didnt wake up to a winter wonderland. But in the back of my mind I am thinking have this 3+ inches of rain fallen as snow on my flat roof, I would have been worrying all day if it would hold. oh well...winters last stand. Perhaps we will still have some small overnight storms in May. Those are always fun.

[Dencolo]

Check out the variations in the amount of snow. In the foothills, it looks like 3" of precip was equivalent to about 30" of snow. I think for the East, that may be considered about average (1" liquid = 10" snow). But for Colorado, this was some of the wettest snow I've seen in a long time.

I was in the foothills today and the scenary was awesome. Though I know a lot of the town were without power.

http://www.crh.noaa.gov/bou/precip/precip_map.php

[Tampa Bay Hurricane]

Very heavy snow (over 50 inches) in mountains west of Denver.

[Dencolo]

Denver is now above it's avg liquid total for the year! Sweet.

Also, this was from my post a few pages back, on the Saturday before the storm. I think everyone just laughed at the ECMWF, but it nailed it while the GFS was way off. That model is impressing me this year.

IF YOU BELIEVE THE LATEST ECMWF THERE WOULD BE AN EXCESSIVE
AMOUNT OF PCPN OVER NRN CO FM THU NIGHT THRU FRI NIGHT AS IT SHOWS
FROM 3-5 INCHES OF WATER IN THE FOOTHILLS AND ALONG THE FRONT RANGE
WITH THICKNESS VALUES SUGGESTING MUCH OF THIS WOULD FALL AS SNOW
ABOVE 5500 FT.

[PTPatrick]

probably time to let this post go to bed. There is always the chance of nighttime snow levels below 5500 in May, but it doesnt seem to happen most of the time. Winter didnt turn out so bad. My rough estimate of total accumulation at my house downtown for the season thus far (mind you this is using some official numbers and some that I measured) around 45 inches. Not bad considering I was hovering aroudn 23 inches in early march. These past 2 storms really helped. Still a bit below average, but definite improvement over what it was. Lets hope we get a nice little late night early May thundersnow and bring it up by 4 or 5 inches...but I wont hold my breath.

[Dencolo]

We are supposed to get some decent QPF tonight. Now they are saying some of this could be snow - my forecast is calling for 1-3" of snow overnight. But with .5"-1" of QPF forecasted, the time of changeover from rain to snow would be the wildcard. Amazing how Spring forecasts change so drastically.

[PTPatrick]

I wasnt even really paying attention weather the past couple days but I know as of yesterday midday when I did a quick forecast check there were not calling for snow. Woke up to quite a surprise this AM, which is always fun. Patio table holding 3.5 inches as of 630 this AM...but its still be snowing for almost an hour so we are getting close to 4 I think. Looks like its breaking up on radar. I bought a bunch of plants yesterday and left them out!...I am so dumb. Fortunately I doubt think they are plants that snow will really hurt and since the temp isnt below freezing yet here downtown, they shouldnt be too bad.