Saw snow in September for the first time today.

[ryanek9freak]

I got stuck on Pikes Peak in 06, in july while watching the Hill Climb from Devil's Playground. Freak storm rolled in and dumped about a foot of snow in an hour. Mind you this was July 4th weekend...

[Islandsnow]

Do you have any pictures to post of the snow?

[proveick]

Pikes Peak today.http://www.cograilway.com/Summit/summitcam.jpg

[Skifreak189]

Jazzlover, you are quite right. What I said was based on my observations of the past two years. When I was working at Arapahoe Basin during the '09-'10 season it was an El Nino winter, and time and time again I watched the winter storms take a very southerly course. This resulted in the mountains of Southern Colorado and New Mexico to get pounded with snow. I remember that March the Snake River Basin was at 33% of its normal snowfall. This wasn't due to abnormally warm temperatures, but due to the jet stream taking the moisture and storms further south than Summit County. Last year was a La Nina year in the Pacific, and even though I was now living on the Front Range, every time I watched the Doppler radar and went up to the resorts on the weekends I noticed a significant difference in the amount of snow from the year before. This was because during a La Nina event the jet stream stays further north, and thus the winter storms were impacting the northern and central parts of the state as opposed to the Southern part of the state and the Front Range. Apparent in this was the profound lack of upslope storms last winter as opposed to the winter before.

All I was implying by my last comment was the fact that during El Nino years the jet stream tends to track further south, bringing the moisture to the southern states more so than the northern parts, and during La Nina events the jet stream tends to track further north, bringing the subsequent moisture with it. Still, I have noticed that there are many exceptions to this rule as in weather Colorado tends to "do its own thing" and trends such as this one may not always hold true with the complex geography, distance from sources of moisture, and the different angles that storms may hit the mountains.

[proveick]

Some turns at Silverton.
Ski patrol takes first turns of the season | 9news.com
RP

[CosmicWizard]

Although I was out of the area at the time, my wife told me there was snow in the Colorado National Monument on the morning of September 15th.