Pleasant workweek with a chance of showers heading into midweek
Sunday, September 20, 2026
Skies have turned mostly sunny this Sunday at noon in Steamboat Springs with temperatures in the upper-50s, after impressively persistent storms brought rainfall from Wednesday evening to Saturday night. Much quieter weather begins today and lasts through the workweek, with clouds and possibly brief showers from later Tuesday into Wednesday morning, right around the autumnal equinox, which occurs at 6:04 pm on Tuesday.
Official records from the long-term weather station behind the high school show 1.46” of rain from Wednesday afternoon to 7 am Saturday, and I measured another third of an inch through the day near the Steamboat Ski Resort, likely bringing the monthly total so far to around 2”, already near the 2.32 monthly average. This was after a relatively wet August bringing 2.77” of rain, almost an inch above the 1.8” average.
The rain was courtesy of a healthy plume of monsoonal moisture rotating northward between high pressure over the Southeast and an eddy of low pressure, now in Wyoming, that lumbered across the Great Basin. Westerly winds behind the storm have swept the monsoonal moisture eastward and brought cooler temperatures today, with high temperatures in the mid-60s, below our average of 72 degrees.
A weak area of low pressure is forecast to cross southern California on Monday while a ridge of high pressure builds over Texas behind the Wyoming storm. The building ridge will force the eddy across the Great Basin on Tuesday, even as it shears and weakens, leaving some behind in southern California. As what is left of the eddy moves into Wyoming on Wednesday, we may see brief showers from later Tuesday into Wednesday morning as another round of monsoonal moisture is drawn northward between the low and high pressures.
Another pulse of monsoonal moisture is possible on Thursday as a relatively well-defined lobe of energy is drawn northward around the Texas high pressure. Meanwhile, a storm is forecast to develop in the Gulf of Alaska by midweek and cross the Pacific Northwest coast near the end of the workweek before being deflected to the northeast as the Texas ridge builds into the Great Plains.
While the storm will be well to our west and eventually north, westerly winds associated with the storm are forecast to push the monsoonal moisture plume to our east, resulting in a nice weekend. But that may not last, as another Pacific Northwest storm develops and perhaps interacts with a forecast hurricane approaching Baja after the weekend.
So enjoy a pleasant workweek while we dry out from the recent rains, and I’ll have the latest weekend details in my next regularly scheduled weather narrative on Thursday afternoon.
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