Steamboat Springs area weather forecast from Friday

Friday, May 6, 2016

Another large Pacific storm that split along the West Coast yesterday has left a large slow-moving closed low, cutoff from the jet stream, near Las Vegas, with energy ejected in the southwest flow ahead of the storm bringing the thunderstorms observed this afternoon. A trailing cool front will be dragged over our area by the northern part of the split tonight, keeping showers going through this evening.

A slot of dry air is forecast to be tantalizingly close to our area Saturday morning and may bring some sun to start the day. However, showers will once again reform, possibly becoming strong with thunder in the afternoon, as more energy is ejected from the southwest storm as it trundles eastward across the Great Basin.

We may have some sun early in the day for Mother’s Day, though a band of showers forecast to be mostly north of our area in the morning may sneak southward enough to preclude that. Showers will reform or continue in the unsettled weather for the afternoon.

By Monday, the storm will be east of us, though we will still be susceptible to showers during the day as energy rotates around the backside of the low.

A colder storm from the Pacific Northwest is forecast to quickly follow this storm after a brief break during Tuesday, keeping the active weather going for later in the day Tuesday and Wednesday, with snow a possibility down to the valley floors by Tuesday night.