Federal Heights, CO 80260 Weather

Key messages

- Areas of again fog tonight across northeast and eastern Colorado.

- Mild and mostly dry through Saturday.

- Unsettled weather returns late Sunday and Monday.Mountain snow is likely (>70% chance) above 8500ft during thistime. High uncertainty remains for the foothills and plains.

.DISCUSSION /Through Friday/: Issued at 111 PM MDT Fri Oct 30 2026

Water vapor satellite imagery showsa shortwave trough over southern California bringing widespread clouds and scattered rain showers to the Desert Southwest. Ahead of this, there is a dry slot which will result in mostly clear skies for northeast Colorado through this evening. High clouds then increase late tonight and persist through Saturday morning. At the surface, the pattern changes very little as a surface trough remains near the base of the foothills, which will help keep low level moisture in place over northeast Colorado. This will lead to another round of fog late tonight and Saturday morning. The mid and high clouds associated with the shortwave trough tracking east-northeast across the intermountain west will shift east of the area midday Saturday. Mostly sunny skies are expected during the afternoon, helping to push temperatures into the upper 50s to mid 60s across northeast Colorado.

Southwest flow aloft will increase during the day Sunday as two systems off to the west take aim at the region. The first one system, a shortwave trough moves across southern California and tracks east-northeast Sunday and Monday. This system will run ahead of the second system on Sunday, carrying subtropical moisture with it and, like many of the recent systems, bring moderate to heavy rain to the Desert Southwest and Four Corners Region. For north central and northeast Colorado, this has resulted in scattered showers over the mountains and just cloudy skies for northeast Colorado. The second system tracks eastward across Oregon and northern California Sunday and then moves across Colorado Monday. The best chance for rain and mountain snow will come late Sunday night and Monday as the main trough moves overhead. The snow level starts off high, above 11,000 feet but quickly lowers to 8,500 to 9,000 feet by Monday morning. Snow is expected to continue into Monday night when flow aloft turns north-northwesterly, a somewhat favorable direction for orographic lift across the north central mountains. Temperatures will be cool Monday due to the overhead trough and cloud cover. Northerly flow behind the trough Tuesday will keep temperatures cool with highs in the 50s with dry conditions.A few earlier model runs combined these two systems over the Central Rockies producing a strong storm system, but this scenario now looks very unlikely.

The broad troughiness shifts east of the area sometime late Tuesday/early Wednesday with ridging replacingit, most likely for Wednesday. We expect to see a bump up in temperatures with dry conditions. The ridging is expected to progress east of the area on Thursday. What replaces it is still unclear. The next upper level trough moves over the western states onThursday. Still very little model agreement on the placement, strength, and track of the upper level trough for Thursday and Friday. For the forecast, temperatures should be near normal. We will have some low PoPs in the mountains and keep the plains dry for now.

.AVIATION /18Z TAFS through 18Z Saturday/: Issued at 1126 AM MDT Fri Oct 30 2026

Fog has moved out of the TAF sites, leaving VFR conditions through this evening. Winds will be light from the east/northeast this afternoon, becoming light and variable this evening, and turning towards drainage overnight. Models have another circulation forming to the north and east of DEN, turning winds northerly or variable at the TAF sites around 12Z. Fog is forecast to develop again in the early morning, approaching BJC and DEN around 10Z or 11Z, potentially moving over the airports between 12Z and 16Z. We have a tempo for LIFR conditions during that time window at DEN and BJC. Fog will start to clear between 16Z and 18Z. Once again, fog is expected to stay just to the north of APA.

Watches, warnings and advisories

None.