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Forecast Discussion:
The front, that came through in two waves yesterday, has cleared the state in the south (Figure 1). This created up slope flow that brought rain to much of the area overnight and some low clouds and areas of drizzle in northeast Colorado this morning. Along with the moisture, we still have a weak fetch of smoke from the west circulating around (Figure 2). I'll be happy when the fires are out, but that goes without saying.
Tomorrow morning (Figure 3) we have another front entering northeast Colorado with continued chances of showers here and there.
Figure 1: The forecast surface map for Wednesday noon. From NCEP.
The longer range forecast:
Be it a tropical low or a short wave trough, when they are trapped beneath a ridge, they move slowly and are hard to predict (steering winds are light). Figure 4 shows that the trough that has brought us cooler weather and 'some' rain chances for days is STILL drifting past us on Friday (later by 2 days or more from the forecast earlier this week). So the showers and cool weather will wear on almost to the weekend.
Figure 5 shows that we still don't expect much rain along I25, but the foothills may get over an inch of water by Friday. Figure 6 shows this (more extended) cooler and wetter period through Friday and hints at a big hot dry spell next week. More later!
