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763 FXUS65 KBOU 281152 AFDBOU Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Denver/Boulder CO 452 AM MST Wed Jan 28 2026 .KEY MESSAGES... - Dry and mild today. - Light snow for the northern mountains this evening into Thursday midday, with scattered but generally minor travel impacts. - A shallow cold airmass may backdoor into northeast Colorado on Friday, with a chance of light snow over the far northeast plains. - Mainly dry and mild weather this weekend through Monday. Next chance of precipitation toward Tuesday or Wednesday of next week. && .DISCUSSION /Through Tuesday/... Issued at 130 PM MST Tue Jan 27 2026 Upper level ridge axis will shift east across the state late tonight and Wednesday, before the next disturbance arrives by Wednesday evening. This particular system is working onto the west coast this evening, and will weaken as it moves into the ridge axis. That means only limited moisture will be available by the time it reaches Colorado. Nonetheless, at least there will be some light snow for the mountains with sufficient orographics and modest lapse rates. It should start very late in the afternoon or evening Wednesday in the Park Range, and spread to the Front Range Mountains and Summit County through the evening and overnight. Then snow diminishes Thursday morning with drier air arriving for the afternoon. Total accumulations are expected to stay light since moisture is lacking, but thinking 1-4" is still on track for the mountains along and north of I-70, with the higher end in the northern tier of CO mountains. Mild temperatures and relatively light winds can be expected on the plains, but we do expect a pretty healthy deck of high clouds to overspread the area. Thus, temperatures will be kept from max warmup potential, but they should still be well above normal and reach the mid 40s to lower 50s, with the cooler spots in valley locations where inversions will be hard to overcome due to the clouds. For Thursday, there is only slight cooling expected behind the weakening shortwave. For Friday, a backdoor cold front is still expected to arrive in the afternoon, but most of the day (except in the northeast corner) should still be mild with high temperatures at or above normal. The weak front will offer up some shallow upslope and a chance of light snow or flurries, but mostly on the northeast plains. That front is quite shallow so most models agree the cooling will be short-lived. Above normal temperatures are expected to return this weekend with dry conditions persisting under a large ridge of high pressure centered to our west. We do see an opportunity for some snow toward Tuesday of next week when a trough arrives, but there is considerable uncertainty as to how that evolves. Thus, we`ll stay in the middle of model guidance with just slight cooling and a chance of precipitation toward Tuesday. && .AVIATION /12Z TAFS through 12Z Thursday/... Issued at 451 AM MST Wed Jan 28 2026 Models keep a westerly component to the winds at DIA well into this afternoon. The forecast low level pressure gradient is in agreement. There could be a brief period of weak north or northeasterlies at the big airport later this afternoon/early evening with a weak upper trough moving across Colorado. There is decent west and northwesterly flow aloft behind the trough and most of the models bring that flow down to the surface overnight with no normal drainage winds indicated for DIA. There will be no ceiling issues through the TAF period. && .BOU WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES... None. && $$ DISCUSSION...20 AVIATION...66