Tuesday PM Update: Colder Wednesday and Thursday with Snow Showers Possible

Like we discussed in this week's SOTA, there is a weak system moving through and that may produce some snowfall.

That is still the case for Denver, meanwhile, parts of the plains may have a few to several inches of snow by Thursday.

Let's see what the global models are doing:

GFS

EC

You can see the trend here between the models is to increase snowfall totals in the triangle created by I-76, I-70, and the border. Within that area, some folks will have a decent snowfall. There is a Winter Weather Advisory for Yuma County Wednesday night.

For Denver, those totals aren't all that impressive as you can see. In an interesting aside, however, the GFS ensemble gives Denver 4" of snowfall and has consistently been delivering that much. Meanwhile, the operational GFS and EC/EC ensembles are much less as shown above. We will discount the GFS ensemble as a result of its resolution, which may include Denver as part of the eastern plains snowfall due to its larger grid spacing.

As we increase the resolution of modeling we see a downward trend in potential snowfall. The hi-res NAM versus the HREF:

The higher the resolution the lower the total snowfall, which makes sense considering the lack of energy with this particular trough passing through.

There will be areas of freezing drizzle and rain with the snow chances, but overall a low probability for impact for the metro areas.

Just looking at Denver for the moment, here is the probability of snowfall by varying amount:

And, a rain, freezing rain, snow chance timeline starting at 4pm Tuesday:

So, as discussed earlier this week we remain on track to see the system pass through Wednesday night into early Thursday. The system remains weak, and with little total precipitation for Denver. However, parts of the plains and eastward will have some decent snowfall and moisture from this system.

Temperatures will also be cooler for a couple of days (also starts 4pm Tuesday):

Beyond this system, another ripple may move through Sunday but it too looks 'weak' at this time. Keep in mind that Denver averages 7.5" of snowfall in November... seems like a stretch for the first half of the month to produce anything substantial toward that total.