Current snowpack and December precipitation to date

12/20/24 8am: Good morning, Happy Friday! Since we have a stretch of warm and dry weather thought it would be a good time to check-in on the statewide snowpack. After a pretty dry December so far, especially over southern CO, the statewide snowpack numbers have dropped off considerably since end of Nov (but that is how it goes some seasons, we always get some sort of break in the pattern typically).

The statewide snowpack is now 90% of normal (median) for the date, largely being held up by central / north-central and parts of south-central / southeast CO. The current snowpack has now fallen below levels in 2018-2019, 2019-2020 and 2022-2023 (but close to that). Second image shows the statewide timeseries with the previous 6 seasons (7 including this season).

Snowpack has really dropped off in the San Juans but with the huge numbers coming out of November, still around 90-95% across western and eastern San Juans (Silverton to Wolf Creek, that is ok, there are much worse years), but a far cry from the 250% of average in November.

Lowest snowpack is in northwest CO (which had a dismal start but is starting to catch up), with 77-79% across Yampa to Laramie river basins (Flat Tops, Park Range, etc)

And its good to see that our local mountains (Colorado to South Platte) and the Aspen area / Elks are holding steady around 95-100% of average.

Highest snowpack is still in the Arkansas River Basin (Collegiates, Pikes Peak area and Sangres / Wet Mountains) which is a bit unusual this time of year, but still bolstered by the monster November storm and some good storms in early Dec (when the rest of CO didn't get much), 114% there.

Here are the basin numbers (shown in image 1 below):

• Arkansas (Collegiates, Sangres, Pikes Peak): 114%

• Gunnison (south Elks, West Elks, B): 100%

• Colorado Headwaters (Grand, Summit, Eagle, Pitkin co. ski areas): 95%

• Upper Rio Grande (Easter San Juans, Wolf Creek): 91%

• South Platte (Front Range mountains): 91%

• San Miguel-Dolores-Animas-San Juan (Western San Juans, Telluride, Silverton, Purg): 90%

• Laramie and North Platte (east-side Zirkel, west-side Cameron): 79%

• Yampa-White-Little Snake (Steamboat / Flat Tops): 77%

Lastly, I have included total precipitation month to date (since Dec 1st), image 3 and Percent of Normal Precipitation month to date (image 4)...and you can see it has been below average precip almost everywhere this month except near Colorado Springs (from that larger early Dec storm). Some decent snowfall across the northern Front Range mountains (IPW, RMNP, Medicine Bow) and closer to Park Range (north of Steamboat) in the last couple weeks, so catching up there.

Anyway, light snow returns to the mountains late Sun night through Tue morning with two back to back quick moving waves (the Mon night into Tue morning wave being the strongest) with 2-6" of snow likely for the north-central mountains.

We will be heading to Costa Rica (southeast coast: Puerto Viejo area) early tomorrow morning for 1 week. Thomas Horner will be taking over the weather report in terms of forecasting while I'm gone (so I can be fully immersed in the tropical weather lol). I will have one more update tonight with a bit more details for next week.

What are your thoughts on the current snowpack?