Tuesday February 21, 2023
8 News Now —
Another week of freezing temperatures — but sunny skies — in the central Colorado Rockies won’t do much to help snowpack levels that feed the Colorado River.
The extended forecast shows the President’s Day weekend could bring in fresh snowfall to build snowpack levels that have been shrinking over recent weeks. Snowpack levels — that is, measurements of the Snow Water Equivalent (SWE) stored in the snow — stopped growing over the past few weeks.
As of Thursday, snowpack is 131% of normal, down nearly 15% over the past month.
A map on the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation website updates daily as conditions change. Here’s a look at how SWE levels have grown and then fallen over the past three months:
- 102% on Dec. 27
- 117% on Dec. 29
- 139% on Jan. 9
- 153% on Jan. 19
- 142% on Feb. 3
- 131% on Feb. 16