Wednesday – Sunday Weather:
We are still stuck in the dry and fairly mild pattern this week, and that will continue into the weekend as we continue to see a high-pressure ridge stuck overhead.
We will continue to see dry days with overnight inversions at times, bringing above-freezing temperatures to the upper elevations. Mostly sunny days are expected through the weekend. Highs in the 40s on the mountain to near 50 degrees down at the base.
Slight Cooldown by Monday:
The latest model runs show a cool trough digging south into the Rockies Sunday into Monday. That could bring highs that are a few degrees colder on Sunday but then dropping to highs in the 30s on Monday.
This system will be too far east to bring us any precipitation. The snow showers should stay to the east over the Rockies. Then high pressure builds back in to the east over CA beyond Monday. That will continue the dry pattern and highs will warm back into the 40s for the lower elevations.
The best news with this cooldown may be the mixing of the air with colder nights for snowmaking. Other than that, we are expecting a dry pattern through at least Thursday the 12th.
Long-Range Forecast:
The long-range models continue to point toward the PNA (Pacific North American) pattern shifting negative (West Coast trough) by mid-month, possibly opening up the door to storms tracking into CA.
The latest operational model runs show a splitting system approaching the coast by the 13th-14th, and possibly moving into CA by the 14th-15th. If it splits we could see a cut-off low form or the storm fall apart. It’s still 10 days away, so we’ll watch closely to see if a storm could push in by mid-month.
The pattern could remain open to storms moving through from the 14th to the 18th of December. We finally have some ensemble mean model runs that show near to slightly above average precipitation possible during this 5-day period.
I’ll continue to watch the trends very closely as I want a powder day as much as you do. Hopefully, the mid-month pattern change will happen and will produce a good storm for us…
BA
