From the Fort Collins Coloradoan (Bobby Magill):
The snowpack is nearly 200 percent of average at some monitoring sites in western Larimer County. The South Platte Basin, which includes the Poudre River, has an overall snowpack 157 percent of average as of Friday morning, according to U.S. Natural Resources Conservation Service data. The most robust snowpack in Colorado is in western Larimer County and Jackson County, where some monitoring stations in the Park Range and the Rawah Mountains have a snowpack greater than 200 percent of average for the season.
More coverage from The Greeley Tribune (Bill Jackson):
Going into the 2010 water year, water reserves were at 120 percent of average throughout the [Colorado-Big Thompson Project], Karen Rademacher told a crowd of about 150 during the Fall Water Users Meeting of the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District at the Embassy Suites Hotel. Rademacher is a senior water resources engineer with the water district. But, Rademacher said Thursday, it was late winter snow storms and early spring rain storms that really made the year. As a result, reserves going into the 2011 water year are at 150 percent…
Mike Applegate, president of Northern’s board of directors, said the heavy runoff resulted in 640,000 acre-feet of water leaving Colorado at the Nebraska line, which was another sign of the need for additional storage in the state. That additional storage, he said, would allow better management of water resources. The permitting process, however, for two new projects, the Northern Integrated Supply Project and the Windy Gap Firming Project, continue at a slow pace…
While the Front Range has seen dry weather conditions for the past three months, Rademacher said Grand County — where the C-BT collects water for diversion — has been hit with early wet, snowstorms. Storms Oct. 25-26 and Tuesday and Wednesday, she said, “have got us off to a great start; 30 percent of the entire snow season is already on the ground in our collection area.” There was an estimated 2 feet of snow on the ground near Grand Lake as of last week…
Dave Nettles, Division 1 Engineer with the Colorado Division of Water Resources in Greeley, said the peak flow on the South Platte River at Kersey came in June and was about twice the average for that time of year. However, by July, it was below average. Reservoir storage all along the South Platte basin is in pretty good shape, he said, despite the dry conditions of the past three months.
It looks like the San Juans are going to get a dumping by Sunday night.