Brilliant fall days ahead
Thursday, October 6, 2022
A spectacular fall day with sunny skies and temperatures in the mid-sixties is over the Steamboat Springs area this Thursday afternoon. More warm sunny days and crisp clear nights are forecast through the long Columbus Day weekend which will provide excellent viewing of the late-arriving but still vibrant fall colors around north central Colorado.
A ridge of high pressure over the West Coast is currently sandwiched between two large areas of low pressure extending southward from the Gulf of Alaska and Hudson Bay. Additionally, an eddy has cut off from our past weekend storm and taken up residence over Baja with no effect on our weather.
The dry air associated with the ridge of high pressure is bringing lots of sunshine which is allowing high temperatures to reach into the mid and upper sixties today, about five degrees above our average of 63 F. The clear skies will also allow for cool morning low temperatures right around our average of 28 F.
A wave traveling down the east side of the ridge looks to bring a cool front to the Front Range on Friday, though current forecasts have most of the cold air staying east of the Divide, so similar weather is forecast for our area tomorrow, with temperatures cooling by several degrees.
A dry wave ejected from the Gulf of Alaska storm is forecast to move through the ridge of high pressure and drop south along the West Coast on Sunday. The wave is forecast to eject that Baja eddy northeastward across New Mexico early in the work week while taking its place, though both of those features will be too far away to affect our weather through early next week.
So continued warm days and cool nights are forecast through Sunday and Columbus Day before there may be a pattern change for our area around midweek, thanks to some Pacific energy traveling through the Aleutian Islands and the northern Gulf of Alaska. However, there is a lot of uncertainty on how much of that energy and cool air we eventually see, with hopes for a significant storm for our area fading the last several cycles of the weather forecast models. So enjoy a spectacular weekend of quintessential Colorado fall weather and color, and I’ll have be back with my next regularly scheduled weather narrative on Sunday afternoon.
