By Jeff Lukas, CIRES Western Water Assessment A month has passed since the devastating floods on the Front Range, and it’s a little easier to discuss the positive effects of the extraordinary rain event for the impacted area, and across Colorado. The first was the significant drought relief that the rains brought, as shown in… Read More


If you missed the Great Front Range Flood of 2013 research seminar, you can now check it out here. Hydrometeorology experts from NCAR and UCAR combine weather and water models for better prediction of floods. The seminar presented what has been learned so far from observations and modeling, including coupled hydrologic modeling. The presenters also… Read More


NCAR’s Research Applications Laboratory and UCAR’s COMET program present a webinar this afternoon (Friday): The Great Front Range Flood of 2013 Rita Roberts, Jenny Sun, Dave Gochis, Barbara Brown, and Matt Kelsch The deadly flood that occurred in the Front Range during the week of September 10th, 2013 is believed to be the worst in… Read More


  CIRES is home to insightful and innovative scientists – we knew that already. But many of them turn out to be incredible photographers as well. Please check out our photostream on Flickr, especially the Front Range Floods photoset. THANK YOU to CIRES colleagues who shared their work.  … Read More


Did you miss it? If you could not attend the CIRES Western Water Assessment panel discussion on flood, weather, climate today, here it is:  http://cirescolorado.adobeconnect.com/p751cdslj7x/ Our apologies to those who couldn’t get video feed during the panel. We are working to understand the glitch — some people saw it, others did not, creating understandable frustration.… Read More


  The CIRES Western Water Assessment has released a preliminary assessment of September 2013’s severe flooding, including information on weather, water, climate and risk. More: http://wwa.colorado.edu/resources/front-range-floods  … Read More


Expert panel, Wednesday, 11 am MT: Extreme weather and connections to climate change: How unusual were September’s floods? A panel of science experts will convene at the University of Colorado Boulder Wednesday, to discuss weather and climate related to the recent devastating floods. Panelists will discuss the unusual weather conditions that caused the floods, the… Read More


by Jeff Lukas, Western Water Assessment, CIRES In early September, a favorable atmospheric circulation pattern sent copious subtropical moisture streaming towards the Front Range. As that pattern persisted for three days, areas of heavy rainfall fired up repeatedly over the Front Range foothills, leading to 24-hour amounts over 5 inches in some locations and 3-day… Read More


An astonishing map from our colleagues at NOAA’s National Weather Service, Boulder/Denver office: 7-day precipitation totals. More: http://www.crh.noaa.gov/bou/?n=preciptotals_multiday… Read More


CIRES is posting images of the floods on our Flickr site, here. If you would like your photographs added, please contact CIRES multimedia specialist David Oonk, david.oonk@colorado.edu.… Read More