Colorado Climate Blog (original) (raw)

The changing drought landscape after a big storm and May heat

This week’s US Drought Monitor shows big changes across Colorado. The southeastern plains got some much-needed moisture from a big spring storm last week. This led to improvements in the…

No good news in the snowpack and water supply numbers

The peak in mountain snowpack (the amount of water stored in the snow) is typically in early April in Colorado’s southern mountains, and later in April in the north. Looking…

What Season is it Anyway?

Thursday, March 20th marks the spring equinox – the first day of spring according to most calendars. But does spring really start on March 20th? I would argue the answer…

End-of-February snowpack check-in: ok in the north, bleak in the south (plus, a message about our federal government partners)

By the time March rolls around, we have a lot of information about how the snowpack accumulation in Colorado’s mountains is going to turn out. For those familiar with statistics,…

While the last few days have been cold and snowy (with more on the way!), early February brought widespread heat across the state, including the Front Range, West Slope, and…

Light and Heat: A Love Story

Happy Valentine’s Day! Every mid-February we take a day to let our romantic partners know how much they mean to us, or perhaps more cynically, to give money to Hallmark.…

The curious case of the cold in Gunnison

Across Colorado, this December has been much warmer than average, a bookend to what will end up as one of the warmest years on record statewide. Except there’s one spot…

A whopper of a snowstorm

The six months from May through October were the warmest on record across Colorado, and parts of the state had been quite dry over that time period; you can read…

The Colorado killer tornadoes of November 4, 1922

A couple years ago, before we had a blog, I put together an analysis of a truly remarkable severe weather event from Colorado history on its 100th anniversary: the killer…

First snows in Colorado

Our last blog post took a look at the timing of first freezes in Colorado. October has been extremely warm thus far, and many parts of the state are still…