Delayed ski season and fall wildfires possible in Colorado if NOAA outlook pans out

For the first time in several years it felt like a pretty typical summer across Colorado thanks to the North American Monsoon. The monsoon is a seasonal wind shift that brings tropical moisture into Colorado, setting the stage for afternoon showers and storms, especially during the months of July and August.

This year's generous monsoon flow brought enough consistent rain to ease the drought in many areas. In fact it was completely wiped out in the mountains along the Continental Divide.  At times the rain was so heavy it caused urban flash flooding in parts of metro Denver along with burn scar flash flooding in the mountains.

The maps below show the state of the drought in Colorado on May 26 vs. August 25. While a lot of areas saw vast improvement, conditions worsened in the northeast counties while there was very little change on the western slope.

The main message of this story for all of Colorado to hear is don't get too complacent with things as we transition into fall, especially if you live in an area that saw drought conditions improve over the summer. Fall is known for being a quiet time of the year when it comes to Colorado weather. But for the third year in a row we are facing a fall season with a La Niña weather pattern in place, and that can mean conditions so warm and dry that we see unexpected wildfires and difficulty making enough snow to jump start the ski season. 

The current 90-day outlook from NOAA, which covers the months of September, October and November, calls for a warm and dry period. The darker colors on each outlook indicate a higher chance for it to be warm and dry as compared to the lighter colors.

In the short term Colorado is expected to remain under a stubborn ridge of high pressure through at least the first week of September. That translates into a mostly dry stretch of days with temperatures running above where they should be for this time of the year. Denver is potentially facing as many as 7-10 days in a row with a high in the 90s starting Tuesday. Afternoon storm chances will be very low through the Labor Day weekend.

While this article is mostly bad news, I do want to throw out a few things that could happen, which may shed a little hope on things. There is always the potential that a tropical system will take a path that brings the remnants into Colorado. It doesn't happen often, but we can get "left overs" from hurricanes, especially when they hit areas like the Baja of California.

There is also always a chance to see some late season monsoon moisture. While Colorado typically sees the monsoon end by late August each year, the North American Monsoon doesn't officially end until the end of September. 

Something else we can hope for is that the Farmers' Almanac is correct with their winter prediction issues earlier this month. They are predicting things to be very cold and snowy in Colorado starting in December. You can read more about that here. Hopefully this will be a La Niña fall that surprises us and brings occasional wet weather to keep the fire danger down, and enough cool nights to allow ski resorts to start making snow on time.