Endless snow… that's how it's felt this week here in Southern Colorado. Low pressure has been stubbornly stuck as it trudged through the Four Corners region before pivoting into an Albuquerque low. Let's talk about what an Albuquerque low is.
Fundamentally, an Albuquerque low is a strong low-pressure system that tracks northeast near Albuquerque, New Mexico, and then through southeastern Colorado. Winds around low-pressure spin counterclockwise. Where you are relative to the position of the low determines your wind direction and, therefore, your storm impacts.
These systems form when a dip in our jet stream called a trough dives to the south from the Pacific U.S., and the low breaks off from the rest of the jet stream… which normally acts as our storm conveyor belt. We call this isolated low a cutoff low. Once the storm is separated from that conveyor belt, it then tracks over New Mexico. Then the storm tracks northeast toward southeastern Colorado. This brings southeasterly, easterly, and finally northeasterly upslope winds to Southern Colorado.
Warm and wet air, typically from a southern stream, then rides up above cold surface air. This enhances precipitation, with the low's strength determining the strength of gusty winds. More powerful low… more powerful winds.
Finally, it helps if we have a setup like we've seen this week with high pressure over the plains blocking the storm from moving anywhere fast. This leads to long-duration storm events that produce more snow in Southern Colorado than for northern areas like Denver.
Generally speaking, an Albuquerque low is our best setup for snow. Next week, our storm conveyor belt returns to a more west-to-east flow, meaning no more stuck-systems in the near future.
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