Forecast discussion for the Upper Midwest

Updated --  April 24th 12:43pm

Highlights-  Last post of the season...

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Short Range- 0-6 days- (Following is written solely for N.MN and the UP of MI as they are likely the only areas left in the region that still have ski resorts open)
Pattern change from recent warmth to much cooler conditions has already taken place or it soon to do so. Mid week snows for the Arrowhead of MN- accumulations likely in the 2-5" range. Snow will melt, but not as fast as it should this time of year with temps  below freezing at night and upper 30's  until late in the  weekend.
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Long Range 7-21+ (updated 12:48pm  April 24th)

Temps should return to near normal temps for the first week of May. Remains of the previous colder pattern may linger enough to produce some very light snows sometime around Friday,  May 5th.  Should have more May like temps for the 2nd full week of May.

Thanks for reading.

Next update --when conditions are warranted.

 

JB

Mostly light additional snow, then a mostly sunny weekend, and  more snow next Tuesday and Wednesday (heavier)!

HOW ARE WE DOING (please contact chris@snowforecast.com or comment below)? Let us know please...

Light snow for most areas including Aspen, and  across southwest Colorado...

-The latest storm absolutely dumped RAIN and snow across southern California, is headed mainly along the Mexico border now, and taking a southern track... El Nino style, with a few" of snow across southwest Colorado to Aspen's mountains, under a moist southwest flow of moisture across the mountains, while most energy passes to the south

This coming weekend we expect a high pressure ridge to build in, with cooler air dragged into Colorado initially on Saturday, as the southern tracking low pressure system exits (northwest/ north flow of winds from the colder north), and sunshine pops through in the then drier air... Powder + sunshine, what Colorado is known for!

LONGER RANGE:
It looks like El Nino is not an official anomaly yet, as I expected in my September LR forecast (for Aspen and SW Colorado / For northern Colorado resorts) so we are in an ENSO Neutral phase, though in the latest update from NOAA, we are seeing warming waters, still a weak El Nino at best. This may explain the more southerly tracking storm systems we have seen, and will likely see in the coming weeks of December and January. CM

Next week, the 11th onward, we expect a couple of snow storms and some moderate to significant snow for western Colorado. Because these look like strong and cold systems (ask Niseko, Japan) with a good fetch of moisture across the Pacific, they are capable of good snowfall across all of western Colorado if the track is right (a bit more north). It looks like 2 storms total for next week, one Tuesday/ Wednesday and another late next week. CM

(NO CHANGE from the last LR update) : It is looking like we may see a busy time as we approach the Christmas and New Year holiday period, with some significant storms possibly lining up to affect all of the western US including Colorado... We expect to see a 7-14 day period of down time and mostly sunny skies following this series of storms, that may start around/ after Christmas. In January we see that down time to start the month (a week-ish), then storms should kick in again on a more regular basis, but possibly favoring northern resorts this time as the east coast gets hit hard and these systems brush mainly northern Colorado. More updates are coming. Do you have any ideas on what you want to see in our discussions? Please contact through the site! We do not charge for any of our info, and have been providing it all for free since 1998, "Predicting Sick Days since 1998"! CM