I drove down Clear Creek Canyon from Idaho Springs yesterday and the creek was boiling. It’s runoff time in earnest now. The Golden gage is showing 878 cfs this morning.
Here’s a report from Joey Bunch writing for The Denver Post. From the article:
Rivers were running at more than twice their historic mean, and the Eagle River below Gypsum and the Arkansas River near Parkdale were nearing records…
Flows on the Poudre were nearly three times faster than normal for the date. “I’m afraid we may not have reached the high-flow period yet,” said Heidi Koontz, spokeswoman for the U.S. Geological Survey in Colorado “Typically, the high-flow period comes in the middle of June.”[…]
In southern Colorado, the National Weather Service issued a flood warning Sunday afternoon for low-lying areas in the Cañon City area, as the Arkansas River and tributaries became gorged with runoff. The city of Boulder issued a bulletin Sunday morning urging caution, with Barker Reservoir by Nederland expected to spill heavily into Boulder Creek during the next few days. Boulder Creek was flowing at 120 cubic feet per second Sunday, but as the spill begins, flows could spike as high as 420. “A flow of 300 to 400 cfs is considered dangerous for swimming and wading,” the city warned in its bulletin…
Brenda Worley, owner of Colorado River Guides in Yampa, said the Colorado and Eagle rivers were a study in contrasts. She operates tours on both. The Colorado River is regulated by dams, meaning it rarely gets too mild or too wild, and the season can last until August. The Eagle is fed by snowmelt, which means frigid temperatures and gushing flows in June, Worley said. “We may be lucky to still have water by the Fourth of July,” she said, “but it may be pretty fast between then and now.”