tacoman25 Posted May 18, 2011 Share Posted May 18, 2011 Just saw a funnel cloud briefly form, lower, and then dissipate from my office in north Denver. Tornado warning went up for north metro area, but it doesn't look like there's been a touchdown at this point. Lots of heavy rain/hail as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mayjawintastawm Posted May 18, 2011 Share Posted May 18, 2011 Just saw a funnel cloud briefly form, lower, and then dissipate from my office in north Denver. Tornado warning went up for north metro area, but it doesn't look like there's been a touchdown at this point. Lots of heavy rain/hail as well. Dry as a bone here in Aurora, though it's quite dark off to the west. A funnel cloud and 50 degrees... weird. I still have yet to see my first tornado or even a funnel cloud. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mayjawintastawm Posted May 18, 2011 Share Posted May 18, 2011 Love the 4 PM KDEN observation: ' Thunderstorm Heavy Small Hail/Snow Pellets Rain' , 43 °F Ah, springtime in Colorado. All we need to see on the next OB is the kitchen sink. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vandy Posted May 19, 2011 Share Posted May 19, 2011 As much as the last storm missed the western suburbs and foothills, this one is hitting us hard in Boulder. Giant puddles everywhere on roads and fields. We've already had 3/4" at CU-Boulder. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vandy Posted May 19, 2011 Share Posted May 19, 2011 We ended up with about 1.2" of rain here in Boulder. GFS is calling for 3-4" of rain for Denver next Tuesday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chinook Posted May 19, 2011 Author Share Posted May 19, 2011 We got 1.6 to 1.7 inches since Tuesday night. We got 1.0 to 1.8 inches since yesterday (Wednesday) afternoon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mayjawintastawm Posted May 19, 2011 Share Posted May 19, 2011 Boy am I fickle. Two weeks ago we couldn't buy rain and I was missing the closed-low nirvana of Southern New England. Now I kinda sorta wanna just see some SUN! ...though this morning I made a date with my kids to find a place to go sledding on the 4th of July. I think we can do it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tacoman25 Posted May 19, 2011 Share Posted May 19, 2011 Boy am I fickle. Two weeks ago we couldn't buy rain and I was missing the closed-low nirvana of Southern New England. Now I kinda sorta wanna just see some SUN! ...though this morning I made a date with my kids to find a place to go sledding on the 4th of July. I think we can do it! I know, it's been crazy how quickly we went from endless sun and bone dry to sopping wet and nearly constant overcast. This is really the only time of year (spring) when you can actually go several days around here without seeing the sun. Looks like another sub-50 degree day is on tap...only 44 at 1 pm, and that's my high so far. This will make the fifth one this month...hard to believe after how warm the first ten days were - had three straight 80+ days at one point! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chinook Posted May 19, 2011 Author Share Posted May 19, 2011 Heavy thundersnow at Wolf Creek Pass KCPW 191826Z AUTO 21013G22KT M1/4SM +TSSN OVC002 A2979 RMK AO2 LTG DSNT N AND S Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vandy Posted May 19, 2011 Share Posted May 19, 2011 The models did not pick up on the second round of precip on the Front Range at all. Even today's NAM run had no hint of this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tacoman25 Posted May 19, 2011 Share Posted May 19, 2011 The models did not pick up on the second round of precip on the Front Range at all. Even today's NAM run had no hint of this. Lots of action downstream still...looks as though it could keep up for awhile. This is insane. The past week has easily been the wettest 7-8 day period I've seen here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vandy Posted May 20, 2011 Share Posted May 20, 2011 Just had a ten minute hailstorm pass through Boulder and now just steady convective rain. Looked like they were topping out somewhere around dime sized hailstones. The precip train just continues! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tacoman25 Posted May 24, 2011 Share Posted May 24, 2011 Serious flooding concerns for the eastern plains today. Slow moving storms with heavy rain on top of already saturated ground...could be bad in some areas. Wasn't expecting much rain here today, but it's as dark as late evening out there with moderate rain and lots of thunder right now. Remember the drought? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mayjawintastawm Posted May 24, 2011 Share Posted May 24, 2011 Remember the drought? To build a pool or an ark... that is the question. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vandy Posted May 24, 2011 Share Posted May 24, 2011 Serious flooding concerns for the eastern plains today. Slow moving storms with heavy rain on top of already saturated ground...could be bad in some areas. Wasn't expecting much rain here today, but it's as dark as late evening out there with moderate rain and lots of thunder right now. Remember the drought? Once the pattern switches I'm sure well return to the desert... though I did hear a couple of summers ago was consistently rainy and cool throughout. I wouldn't mind personally! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tacoman25 Posted May 24, 2011 Share Posted May 24, 2011 Once the pattern switches I'm sure well return to the desert... though I did hear a couple of summers ago was consistently rainy and cool throughout. I wouldn't mind personally! Yeah, I mean this is a generally arid climate, no doubt. But what we saw from September 2010 - March 2011 was quite unusual, especially the complete lack of big storms. Summer 2009 was awesome. No 90+ days in June at DEN, which is virtually unheard of, and only 7 in July. Lots of rain/thunderstorms, including an incredible storm on June 23 that dumped 1.12" in 14 minutes: http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KDEN/2009/6/23/DailyHistory.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tacoman25 Posted May 25, 2011 Share Posted May 25, 2011 DEN is now up to 4.73" on the month. This makes May 2011 the wettest month since March 2003, which had 4.81". If we surpass that, it will be the wettest month since April 1999 with 5.35". In addition, DEN's average temp for the month so far is 51.7, which is more than 4 degrees below normal. Good chance this will be a top 5 coldest May and the coldest since 1995. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chinook Posted May 25, 2011 Author Share Posted May 25, 2011 We have had approximately 4" for this month. This is about the same as July 2009 (3.95"). June 2009 was wetter. I was looking at the FTG radar last night, and it showed 4-5" of rainfall east of Denver (over by Fort Morgan) from yesterday's system. I think that was overdone by a little. CoCoRAHS observer "Fort Morgan 6.2 NE" has 5.20" for this month. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chinook Posted May 26, 2011 Author Share Posted May 26, 2011 We got out of the drought Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
baroclinic_instability Posted May 26, 2011 Share Posted May 26, 2011 I was there a month ago and it was brown and dry. I bet it looks nice now. Glad to see the northern front range is out of the drought. Southern front range a different story though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tacoman25 Posted May 26, 2011 Share Posted May 26, 2011 We got out of the drought That yellow area it shows going up past Denver isn't really accurate anymore. DEN is well above normal for the year now, and so are all of the plains east of town after the storm two days ago. You can really see the effect of La Nina...the entire northern half of the country is drought-free. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chinook Posted May 30, 2011 Author Share Posted May 30, 2011 100 knot wind shear over these storms Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tacoman25 Posted June 1, 2011 Share Posted June 1, 2011 So much for our first 90 degree day today. DEN is only at 71 at 1 pm, thanks to a high overcast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mayjawintastawm Posted June 1, 2011 Share Posted June 1, 2011 So much for our first 90 degree day today. DEN is only at 71 at 1 pm, thanks to a high overcast. Yeah, bit of a bust... some areas got up to 85-86 but nowhere near the forecasted low 90s. The NWS never seems to talk much about that. Back in New England there were always interesting discussions in the AFDs about what went wrong/right, with some cool analyses. Then again, there was an AFD like every couple of hours at BOX sometimes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chinook Posted June 2, 2011 Author Share Posted June 2, 2011 Yeah, bit of a bust... some areas got up to 85-86 but nowhere near the forecasted low 90s. The NWS never seems to talk much about that. Back in New England there were always interesting discussions in the AFDs about what went wrong/right, with some cool analyses. Then again, there was an AFD like every couple of hours at BOX sometimes. Coloradoans are sort of battle-hardened to changeable weather. The NWS never discusses forecast busts. Most people don't even blink if the forecast is 10 degrees off. -large effect of sunshine. At higher altitudes, there is less atmosphere above us to absorb sunlight and IR. -at higher altitudes, air has less heat capacity. That can affect weather regardless of the sunshine issue. -highly changeable synoptic/mesoscale weather. Numerical models have bad forecasts for several reasons. 87 degrees! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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