All,
Let’s start by looking backwards as that’s more interesting than looking forwards. Let’s revel in the storm that just hit us. Eldora got 10” of snow, with more snow falling on some of the worst spots of the East Troublesome fire and Cameron Peak fire. There was 6” at my house in Golden, enough for a little Lookout Mountain skiing.
Five days out, the European and American models were doing great predicting this storm, with the Canadian model too low. Two days out, the European model was still doing great predicting the storm, the NAM and WRF models were doing an okay job, but the American model was way too low, and the Canadian model (and its cousin RDPS model) were significantly too high.
And, although far far away from our patrol zone, although Wolf Creek didn’t get the 32” predicted by the European Model, it still picked up 22”, enough to open tomorrow (10/28) to presumably win the crown as the first Colorado ski area to open this year. Exciting news.
Looking out all the way from today to forecast fairyland, there’s no meaningful snow on the horizon. And temperatures also move warmer later this week. Bummer.
I probably won’t write another forecast until there’s another big snow predicted.
Cheers everyone.
-Jordan (Tuesday morning)
Note: Unless otherwise noted, all forecasts are for 10,000’ in exposed areas. References to American Model are the American (GFS) Model. References to the Canadian Model are the Canadian (GDPS) Model. References to the WRF Model are the CAIC WRF Hi-Res Model. References to the European Model are the European (ECMWF) Model.
