A massive winter storm, blasting subfreezing temperatures and dangerously cold wind chills, continues to sweep across most of Colorado on Monday, from the Eastern Plains to the Western Slope and high country.
And more snow and arctic blasts of air are on the way.
Whiteout conditions and high wind shut down several mountain passes and roads in the mountains and along the Front Range on Monday. Up to 2 feet of snow is expected to fall along the Interstate 70 corridor from Vail to the Eisenhower Tunnel, the Colorado Department of Transportation said, and difficult travel conditions should be expected for the next several days.
“Motorists are likely to encounter blowing snow, limited visibility, sub-freezing wind chills and difficult travel conditions in the mountains for the next several days,” CDOT warned. “Due to the expected wind and snow, delays are likely for avalanche control operations.”
Several mountain passes, including Loveland, Red Mountain, Monarch and Cameron passes, were shut down due to wintry conditions, the department said Monday. Berthoud Pass, west of Denver, was shut down Sunday with no estimated time of reopening, after a snowslide buried 10 cars Sunday.
Travel will remain difficult in the high country through Tuesday and drivers should expect delays as crews remove snow on I-70, U.S. 40, U.S. 50 and other mountain roads, CDOT said.
Forecasters with the National Weather Service said to expect another 4 to 8 inches of snow across the mountains Monday and another surge of arctic air to drop temperatures back to near-zero at lower elevations, with light snow.
Up to 40 inches of snow along U.S. 40 near Rabbit Ears Pass is possible, forecasters said.
The storm brought long-awaited snow to ski resorts — more than 20 inches of powder in the past 48 hours at Arapahoe Ski Basin and 16 inches at Aspen Highlands, according to Colorado Ski Country USA. Some skiers were unable to even reach the resorts as low visibility and snow made for treacherous road conditions.
The storm also put a wrench in travel plans for people flying in and out of Denver International Airport. More than 300 flights were canceled as of Monday morning at the Denver airport, more than any other airport in the country, according to FlightAware.com. On Sunday, nearly 280 flights were canceled at the airport and about 700 were delayed due to snowy conditions.
Avalanche risk remained high (level 4 out of 5) for most of Colorado’s mountain ranges Monday. Large avalanches can easily be triggered and will likely release naturally, the Colorado Avalanche Information Center said. The dangerous avalanche conditions will continue through the day and travel in or below avalanche terrain is not recommended, the center said.
In Denver, the cold weather was a possible factor in the deaths of four people found outside since Friday as temperatures plummeted below zero, according to the city’s Department of Public Health and Environment, though not all of the deaths are suspected to be people experiencing homelessness.
Officials won’t determine a cause of death until autopsies are completed, a spokeswoman for the department said.
Organizers for the city’s 40th annual Marade to honor Martin Luther King Jr. decided to cut the event short this year to limit exposure to the low wind chill and temperatures.
Several public schools and universities announced closures for Tuesday due forecasted below zero wind chill, including Colorado State University.
The Douglas County School District said the deep freeze over the weekend affected its transportation fleet and starting buses in the morning “will be an issue.”
“The windchill is expected to be well below zero tomorrow morning,” the school district said in an email to parents and staff Monday afternoon. “In that environment, frostbite is a very real risk for any exposed skin, so we cannot have kids waiting at bus stops and walking to school, nor can we have staff outside manning car lines.”
The Colorado State Senate also announced it would cancel session due to the weather, according to a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Across the Eastern Plains, forecasters warned of “dangerously cold wind chills” dipping as low as 35 below zero through Tuesday morning. The combination of wind and cold temperatures cause dangerously low wind chill values and if skin is exposed, frostbite could set in, in as little as 10 minutes, the National Weather Service said.
Wind chill values in northeastern Colorado, near the border with Nebraska and Wyoming, dropped to minus 30 to minus 40 degrees, the weather service said.
On his ranch in Cheyenne County on the Eastern Plains, Toby Johnson rose early in minus 1 degree weather — thankfully with minimal snow — to make sure the 1,400 animals on his commercial cow-calf operation were equipped to deal with the brutal cold.
That meant chipping through the layer of ice that had formed on their water troughs and delivering a higher-quality feed.
“The two groups I fed this morning, one was on corn stalks and one was on grass,” he explained. “Normally, in average temperatures this year, I wouldn’t be feeding hay, but I fed them alfalfa hay today to try to keep their energy requirements up. Then it just took a long time to break the ice to make sure they had water. Everything just takes longer.”
Overall, Colorado Livestock Association CEO Zach Riley said that so far he hasn’t heard much in the way of problems for producers. Some have built-in advantages, but also different concerns, when it comes to the weather.
“The advantages of dairies and feed yards is there’s usually more windbreak areas for the animals to get out of the wind and some dairies have covers in certain parts of their operations,” he said. “The biggest challenge for dairies is if roads are impassable. If you can’t get rid of that milk, it causes a big problem on the dairy real fast.”
Based on his reports so far, livestock operations have been managing.
“Usually the storms with the worst impact hit suddenly and they’re very snow-laden — quick and hard, Riley said. “This storm hasn’t had an extreme amount of snow. Knock on wood, but I think we may be out of the woods.”
Colorado Sun writer Kevin Simpson contributed to this story.