A storm aiming to dump up to a couple of feet of snow over the Sierra Nevada and wild weather in general in California Friday will swing Colorado way this weekend with heavy wet snow.
The storm has the potential to bring a foot or more of snow to the mountains and foothills of central and northern Colorado to southern Wyoming.
Portions of I-25, I-70 and I-80 are likely to be affected by slow travel for a time.
Colorado Springs, Denver, Fort Collins in Colorado and Cheyenne, Laramie and Rawlins in Wyoming appear to be in line for at least some wet snow with the foothills around Denver and Fort Collins perhaps receiving a sizable amount of the white stuff.
Due to the marginal temperatures with the storm, a significant amount of the precipitation will fall as rain out of the mountains, making for highly variable snowfall accumulations and forecast challenges.
Snow will wind down over the Sierra Nevada tonight. The bulk of the snow will fall over Colorado during Saturday night into early Sunday. This map shows accumulations through 6:00 p.m. MDT Saturday.
In addition, if the storm were to swing farther south or north from the Rockies, it could correspondingly result in a south-north shift in the accumulating snow away from the mountains.
It does appear that a band of snow will emerge from the Rockies and spill over the northern Plains and into the Upper Midwest later in the weekend. A temperature difference of a couple of degrees will make or break snowfall for these areas.
Since part of the snow will fall at night, it will have a chance of bringing slush on road surfaces even out of the mountains.
In the high country of Colorado, roads are likely to be a mess for a time.
The same storm system could produce a major tornado outbreak over the Plains this weekend.
Severe thunderstorms with the risk of a few tornadoes will advance eastward across the northern Plains and Upper Midwest into Friday.
A dangerous outbreak of severe storms will strike the northern High Plains and Canadian Prairies on Wednesday.
Join us on Thursday for AccuWeather LIVE as we will discuss the debate of climate change and hurricane frequency and the top five things you need to know about summer weather.
A tornado touched down at Denver International Airport as a severe weather system moved through the area.
A brief synopsis of the top five worst weather events of last summer.
Warmth is forecast to build over much of the eastern half of the nation by July, with Alaska of all places helping out.
| Extreme | Location | |
|---|---|---|
| High | N/A | |
| Low | N/A | |
| Precip | N/A |
Philadelphia, PA (1994)
Strong thunderstorm winds blew off a large section
of a hanger roof and also damaged two aircraft.
Connecticut (1794)
A violent tornado started west of the Hudson River,
then travelled on to Poughkeepsie, Waterbury,
North Haven, Milford, and Branford line into Long
Island Sound. Extensive damage; funnel looked
like an "aurora borealis." At New Milford, 28
buildings were destroyed or damaged. A barn door
was carried 9 miles from its original site.
Custer Creek, MT (1938)
Cloudburst; 48 killed in a train wreck.
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