First Alert Weather Day: Snow Gradually Ends, Extreme Cold Goes On
DENVER (CBS4) - Almost the entire Denver metro area was upgraded to a Winter Storm Warning Tuesday night because of heavy bands of snow. The heavy snow has ended and the focus now is the bitterly cold temperatures and continued difficult travel.
Because there will continue to be periods of light snow, temperatures will remain far below freezing, and roads will remain icy and snowpacked, the CBS4 weather team is maintaining a First Alert Weather Day through Wednesday night.
The snow bands that prompted an upgrade to a Winter Storm Warning Tuesday night were mostly on the east side of the metro area. That is why Commerce City is on the list of biggest snow reports in the state with nearly a foot of snow.
Most other areas around Denver, Boulder, and Fort Collins have received 5 to 10 inches of snow although the official report for Denver from DIA Wednesday morning was only 2.1 inches.
The Winter Storm Warning was ultimately canceled around 10 a.m. Wednesday and replaced with a Winter Weather Advisory that will continue through 8 p.m. for Denver and the entire urban corridor north of Monument Hill.
Any additional accumulation will be minor Wednesday afternoon with no more than 2 inches and in most cases, much less.
What makes this storm different from most storms even in February is the extremely cold air. And the cold will be the biggest impact from this storm going forward.
Temperatures will stay in the single digits and teens all day on Wednesday and wind chill temperatures will remain below zero.
And then some of the coldest temperatures of the season will grip Colorado Wednesday night into Thursday morning. The forecast low temperature in Denver is -7 degrees while Greeley could reach -12 degrees or perhaps even colder.
The frigid start on Thursday may also combine with some patchy freezing fog. The combination of extreme cold, freezing fog, and continued icy and snowpacked roads will make for another difficult morning commute on Thursday.
Sunshine will eventually arrive later in the day on Thursday but temperatures will remain below freezing until Friday morning.
