2/17/22 Thursday 8 am
Last night, a weak secondary area of low pressure developed in southeast Utah. The low moved just south of the forecast area through northern New Mexico. The weak low was not strong enough to send southwest flow up to Purgatory so they only benefited from the northern portion of the storm. The result? 2 inches of snow for Purgatory and a widespread amount of 4 to 6+ inches across the lower and mid-elevation areas. Telluride reported 5 inches and Wolf Creek reported 6 inches.
Here are the latest snow reports I have received:
Aztec 1 inch, Trappers Crossing 5 inches, Bayfield 4 inches, Durango WestII 6 inches, Rancho Florida 5.5 inches, CR 225 at HWY160 4 inches, Rafter J 5 inches, Gem Village 6 inches, Rico 2 inches, 6 miles east of Ignacio 4.5 inches, Mancos 4 inches, 4.5 inches @ the intersection of CR 228 and 502. The highest total that was not reported I saw on the CoCoRaHS network: 7.6 inches about a mile southwest of Breen near CR 122.
For today, there is a chance some light snow may redevelop, I don’t expect much in the way of additional accumulations. That being said the models all fumbled the ball yesterday with the low and mid-elevation snow amounts, so you never know.
Next week, back-to-back storms will dominate the weather for us. The first will arrive sometime on Monday. The storms will be stronger and colder and it currently looks like they will have more moisture. The models have been in agreement with this solution for a few days. Once again, the GFS model was the first to “see” this. The Canadian jumped on board next and the Euro is slowly increasing its precipitation amounts.
Here are the predicted forecast totals for the week from the GFS. At the moment, it looks like these storms will be cold so we may have some impressive snow to liquid ratios to deal with.
It is way too early for me to try to forecast this storm, but I am thinking the mountains will see widespread amounts of 1 to 3+ feet. At the moment, it looks like snow will fall at all elevations in the forecast area.
My next update will be on Friday. Thanks for following and supporting the site!