Colorado waited all winter for big snowstorms, but few came until Tuesday, in the middle of spring, when a late-season storm was dropping much needed snow across the Rocky Mountains. Numerous alerts were in effect, including a winter storm warning for the Denver area, and the snow was expected to continue through Wednesday afternoon.
Though the storm is significant and strong for this time of year, experts said it was not likely to end a historic snow drought that led ski resorts to close early and prompted fears across the state about whether fire season would be especially intense.
But, they said, it will help a little.
“This is finally the type of storm we’ve been waiting for for six months,” said Russ Schumacher, Colorado’s state climatologist.
The snow began falling in the mountains early Tuesday and was expected to last through Wednesday morning. By late afternoon, Estes Park, the gateway to Rocky Mountain National Park, had recorded at least a foot of snow, and snow had begun accumulating in Boulder and Denver.
Forecasters said Denver could record three to nine inches of snow, potentially surpassing its highest storm total for the season — on March 6, when eight and a half inches fell in the city.
“This storm has the potential to be the biggest storm of the year, but we won’t know until it’s over,” said Kenley Bonner, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service office in Boulder.
Much more snow will fall in the mountains. Northwest of Denver, up to 30 inches of snow was possible on the highest peaks in Rocky Mountain National Park.
Snow isn’t unusual in Denver in May — but this much is. The city receives 1.4 inches, on average, in May. The last time a May storm brought 10 inches of snow to Denver was in 1978, Ms. Bonner said.
Colorado’s snow pack, a critical source of water throughout the year, had been at its lowest level on record. After Wednesday, the foot or two of snow this storm is expected to drop could nudge the snowpack to its second lowest ever, Mr. Schumacher said.
Colorado’s ski resorts struggled through a warm and muddy winter, and most closed early for the season weeks ago.
But one that hadn’t yet closed — Arapahoe Basin, in Dillon — is taking advantage of the storm. Arapahoe, called A-Basin by local residents, had originally been scheduled to close on Monday, but its season was extended until Sunday, said Shayna Silverman, a spokeswoman for the resort.
Ms. Silverman said some slopes at Arapahoe had stayed open even as other resorts shut down for the season because of a quirk of geography. Arapahoe has a north-facing slope that doesn’t get as much sun as south-facing terrain, where the snow typically melts first, she said. It also sits at the top of the Continental Divide, and its summit goes up to 13,000 feet, and those colder conditions helped what little snow the resort had stick around, she said. And snow making and snow farming by its operations team have helped maintain the slopes, she said.
On Tuesday, two of nine chair lifts were open, and a little more than 7 percent of the trails were open, a majority of them more advanced terrain.
“The fact that we get to keep that going is just so awesome,” Ms. Silverman said.
Once a resort has shut down for the season, reopening is a logistical challenge. Many begin to shift to their summer operations, and employees often follow the seasonal work.
That’s the story at Snowmass in Aspen, where ski patrol members left soon after the resort closed its winter operations on April 17.
Geoff Buchheister, the chief executive of the Aspen Skiing Company, said workers were already busy with trail maintenance for the summer season.
“Much of this work simply cannot be paused and restarted without significant impact to our summer opening timeline,” Mr. Buchheister said.
Loveland Ski Area typically remains open through the first week of May but shuttered for the season on April 26, said Loryn Roberson, a spokeswoman. Workers who are employed in Loveland’s equipment rental shop, lift ticket offices or restaurants through winter take summer jobs with the U.S. Forest Service or head to Alaska for work, she said.
Had the storm happened closer to its closing weekend, she said, maybe the resort could have stayed open longer. But it has been closed for too long at this point, she said.
“Once we close down, we’re closed for good,” Ms. Roberson said.
The winter weather will be short-lived. Warmer weather was expected next week, and along with increasingly longer daylight hours, that will start the snowpack melting again.
As of late last week, nearly 60 percent of Colorado was in an “extreme” or “exceptional” drought, according to the U.S. drought monitor.
This extra snow could help prevent wildfires in the coming weeks, but it’s too soon to know how wildfire season will unfold. Spring and summer precipitation could continue to push off the worst of the season, while a heat wave could bring it on fast.
“In the best-case scenario, we get some regular precipitation and normal temperatures instead of these record-breaking temperatures that we’ve had the past few months,” Mr. Schumacher said. “And that will help mitigate the wildfire risk.”
Amy Graff is a Times reporter covering weather, wildfires and earthquakes.
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