1/22/26 Thursday 3:30 am
Models took a breath and lowered the local totals for this event. All of the models are forecasting similar totals and similar time frames for this to unfold.
Expect light snow beginning on Friday morning, first in the higher elevations, then building across the lower and mid-elevations by Friday night into Saturday.
Winter Weather Advisories have already been issued for 6 to 12 inches for the mountains and 4 to 8 inches for Pagosa. Wolf Creek has an advisory for 5 to 12 inches, which is too low according to every model run I have seen.
Things that stand out to me this morning:
- Model agreement. Always good to see, unless they are all wrong.
- Lower totals east of us. That is good for us because it means the storm spends more time in our area.
- Positioning of the low pressure. Models are delaying the low coming onshore compared to 24 hours ago. This could delay the start of precipitation in our area. Also, a positive because the precipitation could start later in the day and possibly have the colder air in place before the heavier precipitation arrives.
All good stuff; however, I will wait 24 hours before posting my forecast. A lot can still go wrong.
Here are the model snow forecasts: These models forecast snow at a 10:1 snow-to-liquid ratio, which is the default, but it won’t apply to this storm. So if you are so inclined, add 20% to these totals in the lower elevations, and 40% at the ski areas.
Also, I am not worried about who gets missed in the lower elevations yet. There is approximately a 6 to 12 mile margin of error with these models, and they handle subtle terrain changes poorly.
European
GFS
Canadian
If there are any major changes in the late morning model runs, I will post. If not, I will issue my forecast in the morning.