Snow returns Wednesday in higher quantities in the mountains

DENVER — Another quick winter blast is targeting Colorado and could bring rain to snowy areas of Denver on Wednesday.

While pockets of snow are likely, mostly later in the day and evening, the storm system will bring rain first and a noticeable temperature change after the last two days of near-record warmth along the Front Range.

“Here in the city early Wednesday, we’ll likely have some dry roads, and we’ll see increased clouds and temperatures in the 40s in the morning,” Denver 7 meteorologist Lisa Hidalgo said. “We may see intermittent rain early tomorrow but tomorrow afternoon those winds will move out of the north, the cold weather will settle in and we will see a chance of rain and then mixing with snow during the evening drive.”

The chance of rain and snow will continue through Wednesday evening into early Thursday morning and the fast-moving system leaving behind a warm trend on Friday will push into the weekend.

“The snow on the ground won’t add much, and we’ll likely see about an inch of snow in the metro area, maybe less than an inch in some locations,” Hidalgo said.

The cold front will first push across the Colorado Plains by Tuesday night and then bring more moisture to higher elevations. The National Weather Service in Boulder said some snow showers are possible in the northern mountains starting Tuesday night.

The Meteorological Service said that light to moderate snow will fall in the mountains and foothills until Thursday, but there is some disagreement between weather models regarding the amounts of snowfall at higher elevations, but winter weather warnings are likely to be issued.

South Denver and along the Palmer Barrier could get between one and two inches of snow, and the same could happen for far western communities near Denver, Hidalgo said. In the mountains, 4 to 8 inches of snow is possible.

The NWS also said showers in metro Denver should turn to all snow later Wednesday afternoon and accumulations should reach only an inch or two and remaining snow will remain at some higher elevations Thursday morning.

Temperatures will drop from a high of 75 degrees expected on Tuesday to reach just 48 degrees on Wednesday and drop to 30 degrees overnight into Thursday morning.

Friday morning will start well below freezing with a low of just 28 degrees before the temperature rises back into the low 60s by the end of the week. Saturday will be mostly sunny with a high of 58 degrees and Sunday will be mostly sunny with a high of 62 degrees.

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