Seven Days, Three Storms

10 am

There have been some discrepancies over the last few days as to whether or not it is a single storm coming through in pieces or two storms. The consensus now is that it is two storms. It really doesn’t make a difference but I wanted to clarify.

Storm one will start affecting our area Wednesday morning, yesterday the Euro was indicating tonight but it has corrected and joined the other models. (Update-The morning Euro just came out it is back to starting the precip overnight) I have been asked about the warm nature of these storms. The last one and the next one are what we used to refer to as the Pineapple Express. Far-reaching plumes of subtropical Warm moisture that come onshore and work their way into our area. We have had a number of them hit in December and January and still bring rain to low and mid-elevations. I have mentioned this several times now, but we are not done with snow in Durango and Bayfield for the season.

Storm one aka Warm Storm will be similar to what we just went through, with less precipitation and the models have been trending warmer than the last one until this morning, now models are showing similar snow levels to the last storm. Tomorrow I will make a final call on the snow levels. The Warm Storm is going to be a poor (inefficient) snowmaker even at the higher elevations. At the moment the models show this one running out of steam late in the day on Thursday.

Storm two will roll in right on the heels the first one on Friday morning and at the moment, looks like it will be all snow above 6,500-7,000 feet, it also looks like an efficient snow maker but unfortunately, it is a quick mover moving out Saturday morning. Any of this can change for storm two so stay tuned.

Storm three is getting some model agreement so while it is several days out, I wanted to mention it. At the moment it comes in on Monday with another piece or storm Tuesday through Thursday. If this 3rd storm plays out the way the models are now indicating it will be significant. They just keep coming. The good news is that as of yesterday 13 out of the 17 measuring sites for our area are already over 100% of total seasonal snowpack, a month before the peak usually hits.

With the Euro all of the sudden wafflings back and forth I have lost a little confidence and am hoping we will get a little more consensus with that model by tomorrow morning.

Here are the two storm totals from the GFS

Liquid