Weakening storm cycle to end on Sunday

Thursday, February 8, 2024

The 7.5” of new snow at mid mountain and 10” up top at the Steamboat Ski Resort that was reported this Thursday morning has been augmented by around 3” of snow that continued to fall through the morning. We’ve had some peeks of sunshine around noon, but skies are currently overcast this mid afternoon as temperatures hover around 30 F in the town of Steamboat Springs. Snow showers will be around through Saturday as the current storm cycle slowly ends with cool temperatures and sunshine expected by Sunday.

While the storm that brought the snowfall today quickly moves across Minnesota on its way to Canada, several additional upstream storms have carved out a trough of low pressure over the West. Snow showers will continue today in the cool, moist and unstable air mass behind the departing storm leaving 3-6” for the Friday morning report, most of which will have fallen today.

A storm currently near Las Vegas is forecast to move through southern Colorado tomorrow morning, and it should be close enough to restart snow showers over our area by Friday morning. Additionally, a weaker and more disorganized storm passes through Colorado on Saturday which will keep the chance of light snow showers going through the day. I would expect 2-5” for the Saturday morning report, some of which should fall during the day Friday, and 1-4” for the Sunday morning report, most of which should fall during the day Saturday.

Additionally, there is a mass of cold air associated with a final wave currently off the coast of British Columbia. This storm is forecast to quickly move south through the Pacific Northwest early Friday, Nevada later Friday, Ariziona on Saturday and New Mexico on Sunday. While our area won’t see any moisture from this storm, we will see the cold air despite the clearing skies on Sunday, with high temperatures in town falling from the upper twenties on Friday and Saturday to the low twenties by Sunday, which is around ten degrees below our slowly rising average of 33 F.

And our low temperatures will also be on a downtrend from the low teens tonight to the high single digits on Saturday to the low single digits on Sunday. Even colder temperatures around zero or below zero are forecast for Monday morning, which is around five to ten degrees below our average of 7 F.

A ridge of high pressure is then forecast to move over the West early in the work week, but it looks to be weak and disorganized as it interacts with incoming Pacific energy and moisture. Right now, moderating temperatures and more sun than clouds are expected for next week, but be sure to check back to my next regularly scheduled weather narrative on Sunday afternoon for updates to that forecast.