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Daily brief · Monday, September 21
Monday is the dry day of this week. The 6:42 AM zone forecast has mostly sunny and highs 55 to 66, and the NWS grid carries zero precipitation in every block through 6 PM. That grid and CDOT's road forecast both put afternoon gusts near 20 mph; Open-Meteo, which drives the strip below, models 14.
It started cold. The airport read 27 F at 7:25 AM, and the gridded snow level bottomed near 10,263 ft, about 110 ft above town and the lowest this site has recorded. Modeled snowfall was zero, so that is a clear morning behind a front, not snow.
Fremont Pass has held snow water five straight days, 0.1 in since Sep 16, with the depth sensor at zero. Fourteen consecutive days is what this site's record counts as the snowpack starting; the 2010 to 2025 median is Oct 12.
The wet pattern returns Tuesday afternoon and peaks Thursday at 63 percent with about 0.24 in modeled. Above 11,000 ft the forecast now carries snow showers Wednesday through Friday, wording it did not have Sep 18. Town carries none.
The Willow Fire closure expires Sep 30. Five US 24 work zones run today.
Written 2026-09-21, 8:07 AM MT.
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A daily precipitation percentage is the day's own maximum from 5 AM to midnight, not a schedule; an overnight storm crossing the date line counts toward the evening it belongs to, not the morning after. Where a day is wet enough for timing to matter, the orange line under its percentage gives the longest continuous stretch of that day whose own hourly probability reaches most of the daily figure. It is read from hourly model data and, at several days of lead time, that data arrives in multi-hour blocks, so treat the edges as guidance rather than as a start time. The word under each day names the class of weather that lasts, meaning at least two of that day's 5 AM to midnight hours; a single modeled hour of rain or thunder no longer labels an otherwise quiet day, and a snow label additionally needs an hour at or below 36 F.
Data in this page rendered 09/21/2026 08:24 MT (NOAA/NWS models via Open-Meteo, USGS gauges); your browser also refreshes these numbers live on load.
Up high
Model forecasts corrected to each elevation, conditions above treeline are usually far harsher than town. Afternoon thunderstorms are common in summer; most parties plan to be off high summits and passes by early afternoon. The storm-risk line under each peak is a modeled estimate, not an observation: it reads Open-Meteo hourly precipitation probability and CAPE at that peak's own elevation across the 11 AM to 8 PM window, and reports the window peak plus the first hour that reaches 30 percent. It is a planning input for turnaround times, not a forecast of whether a specific storm will hit you. Check the official NWS forecast and read the sky before you go.
Water · flows & temps7-day detail
| Gauge | Flow | Water temp |
|---|---|---|
| Arkansas R. nr Leadville | 13.1 cfs | - |
| Halfmoon Creek | 13 cfs | 42.8°F |
| Arkansas R. at Granite | - | 47.8°F |
Snowpack · checked 2026-09-21
Snow water equivalent 0.1 in, snow depth 0 in, daily value for 2026-09-20. Station medians: first snow water Oct 12, peak 20.8 in on May 11, melt-out Jun 22. First snow water of the season registered on the pillow Sep 14 at 0.1 in, went back to zero Sep 15, and has read 0.1 in every day from Sep 16 through Sep 20, five consecutive days. Sep 14 is 21 days ahead of this station's 2010 to 2025 median first snow water of Oct 5 and the second earliest in those 17 autumns, behind Sep 8, 2020. The depth sensor still reads 0 in, so the pillow is carrying a trace of water without a measurable snow depth: treat it as the season's first snow water, not as an established snowpack. The run that began Sep 16 is five days into the fourteen consecutive days this site's record uses to mark the snowpack actually starting, a threshold whose 2010 to 2025 median date is Oct 12. In 9 of the last 16 autumns the first snow water melted off again before that run began. The year by year record is on the winter guide. The same daily values show the precipitation gauge rising 0.1 in on Sep 18, 0.2 in on Sep 19 and 0.1 in on Sep 20 while the pillow held flat, which reads as rain at 11,310 ft rather than accumulation. Year by year onset dates. Nearest automated snow station to Leadville, on Fremont Pass north of town. Baked in at build time from USDA NRCS data.
Trails & roads · notices verified 2026-09-21
Highway status · checked 2026-09-21, 7:45 AM MT
Leadville to I-70 at Copper Mtn, MP 0 to 22.6. Surface condition operator-confirmed dry at 7:04 AM today. CDOT's NDFD line on this segment, refreshed at 7:19 AM, reads partly cloudy with gusts of up to 20 mph expected, which matches the NWS gridded product for the town point almost exactly: it peaks town gusts at 21 mph between 2 and 4 PM. For live surface status between pulls, CDOT's traveler map at cotrip.org is the authority. · The Lake County zone forecast issued 6:42 AM Monday has mostly sunny, highs 55 to 66 and light winds becoming northwest around 10 mph in the afternoon. Above 11,000 ft the same issuance reads sunny at 47 to 57 with west winds increasing to 10 to 15 mph. The gridded product carries zero precipitation in every block through 6 PM, so today is the clear drive of the week. From Tuesday afternoon the odds climb through Thursday, which peaks at 63 percent.
Minturn at I-70 south to Buena Vista, MP 143.4 to 210.8, the whole Leadville approach in one COtrip segment. Surface condition operator-confirmed dry at 7:04 AM today. CDOT's NDFD line for this segment, refreshed at 7:19 AM, reads partly cloudy with gusts of up to 20 mph expected. No incident records were on the corridor at this morning's pull beyond the long-standing Minturn MP 145.1 placeholder, which has been in the feed since July 16. Scheduled work is the story today and is listed below. · Same shape as CO 91: dry all day, gusts peaking mid-afternoon. Tennessee Pass sits above 10,400 ft and takes the above-11,000 numbers more nearly than the town ones. The gridded snow level for the town point bottomed near 10,263 ft at 7 AM this morning, below the pass and about 110 ft above town, with modeled snowfall at zero in every block. Treat that as a cold clear morning rather than a driving hazard.
MP 167, between County Road 21A and Forest Service Road 145 about five miles west of Leadville North, is continuous with alternating traffic and an 11 ft width limit, running without a break from Sep 20 at 12:00 AM through Sep 26 at 11:59 PM. Four day zones run 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM today: MP 170 between County Road 21 and Tennessee Creek Road, MP 152 between Forest Service Road 762 and the Eagle River near Minturn, MP 148 to 148.5 between Cross Creek Road and Forest Service Road 762 at Minturn, and the paving job from MP 192.74 to 202 between CO 82 east of Twin Lakes and County Road 385 west of Buena Vista. MP 170 and MP 152 repeat every weekday through Friday; MP 148 has Tuesday and nothing after; the paving runs through Saturday. The MP 174 to 175 zone carried here on Sep 18 has left the feed. Pulled from the CDOT planned-events feed Sep 21, 7:45 AM MT.
The US 24 bridge over the Arkansas near Johnson Village goes continuous tomorrow, Tuesday Sep 22 at 7:00 AM, through Friday Sep 25 at 5:00 PM, with the right lane closed for bridge maintenance and an 11 ft width limit. This confirms the window the feed was publishing on Sep 18, to the hour. It is the southern approach from Salida and Poncha Pass, so anyone driving up midweek should plan for it. Pulled Sep 21, 7:45 AM MT.
Highway data from CDOT / COtrip, state highways only: surface conditions and scheduled work from CDOT's road-conditions and planned-events feeds, and active incidents (red bar) from its incident feed, each stamped with the time CDOT reported it. County and forest roads are covered in the notices below.
Fire danger · read 2026-09-21, 7:45 AM MT
Read from the Forest Service alerts page, which posts a rating for each of the eight districts and grasslands it covers. Salida and San Carlos read High this morning; Pikes Peak, South Park, South Platte, Leadville, Cimarron and Comanche all read Moderate. That is the same board as the Sep 16 and Sep 18 reads, three consecutive sweeps without a change anywhere on it. A rating is a daily judgement about how easily a fire starts and spreads; it is not a restriction, and the signed restriction orders are in the notices below. Readings recorded on this site: 2026-08-16 High, 2026-09-15 Very High, 2026-09-16 Moderate, 2026-09-18 Moderate, 2026-09-21 Moderate. Only dates this site actually read the field. The gap between Aug 16 and Sep 15 is not a claim that the rating held steady; nobody here looked. Source: USFS Pike-San Isabel NF.
USFS order 02-12-01-26-36 was signed Aug 19 and runs from Aug 21 at 12:01 AM through Sep 30 at 11:59 PM unless rescinded. It supersedes order 02-12-01-26-33, and the affected recreation site list is not the same. Still closed: Mount Massive Wilderness, Mount Massive Trail 1487, Highline and Native Lake Trail 1489, Willow Creek Trailhead, Elbert Creek Campground, Halfmoon East and Halfmoon West Campgrounds, and Colorado Trail 1776 Segment 11 at the Mount Massive Trailhead. Newly listed compared with the previous order: Mount Massive Trail 1487 and the Colorado Trail segment. No longer listed: North Mount Elbert Trail 1484, Windsor Lake Trail 1490 and North Halfmoon Creek Trail 1485. The described area now runs south of Turquoise Lake, south of County Road 4 and NFSR 105 to Busk Creek, east of the tree line at the Busk Creek switchback, south and east along the eastern slope of Mount Massive to the wilderness boundary near the North Halfmoon Trailhead, east to the main Mount Massive Trailhead, and from there along the NORTH side of Halfmoon Creek to the east boundary of the forest. Whether the standard Mt. Elbert north route falls inside or outside the closure is set by the map exhibit attached to the order, not by the rec-site list, and Elbert Creek Campground is still closed. Call the Leadville Ranger District at 719-486-0749 before you plan on it. Order number, signature date, effective dates, described area and rec-site list were read directly from the order text on Aug 20. Re-read on the full district alert list Sep 21 at 7:45 AM, unchanged and still listed. The order page itself was opened the same morning: its Alert End Date reads September 30, 2026 and the order text reads in effect from August 21 at 12:01 AM through September 30 at 11:59 PM unless rescinded. That is nine days out. An expiry date is not a reopening announcement, and no successor order or extension has been posted; if one appears it will be dated here. This is now the operative closure. Both 2026 Leadville 100 races have now been run on courses rerouted around the earlier version of this closure, with Hagerman Pass Road, Sugarloaf Mountain and Powerline off both. The closure itself outlasts the race season: it runs to Sep 30 unless rescinded, so it governs autumn hiking on Mount Massive and the Halfmoon drainage, not just race week.
Official source: USFS Pike-San Isabel NF
Order 02-12-00-26-37, signed Aug 20, took effect at 12:01 AM on Aug 21 across the Leadville, Salida, San Carlos, Pikes Peak, South Park and South Platte districts, replacing the Stage 2 order 02-12-00-26-29 that had covered the Leadville Ranger District since Aug 2. Its own text ran through Nov 14 at 11:59 PM unless rescinded. As of the Sep 18 sweep at 8:20 AM it is gone: the order is not among the 46 alerts on the forest's alerts page, and the alert page this notice used to link, /r02/psicc/alerts/pike-san-isabel-national-forests-stage-1-fire-restrictions, now returns a hard 404. The forest's own fire restriction page, read the same morning, states that all fire restrictions and closures are posted on the alerts page, and no fire restriction order is posted there today. What that is NOT is a published rescission: no notice saying the order was lifted, and no date, has been found. So the honest reading is that the restriction is no longer posted, not that it is confirmed lifted. Fire danger for the Leadville Ranger District has read Moderate on every sweep since Sep 16, down from Very High on Sep 15. Anyone planning a campfire on forest land should call the Leadville Ranger District at 719-486-0749 and ask, and should note that county restrictions are separate and still apply where they exist. For the record, while it was posted, Stage 1 meant campfires only in a permanent Forest Service fire pit or grate at a developed recreation site, no fire of any kind at dispersed camps including charcoal, on and off liquid or gas devices allowed with three feet cleared, a fully enclosed metal stove with a five foot chimney and a quarter inch spark arrestor allowed with ten feet cleared, and smoking limited to an enclosed vehicle or building, a developed recreation site, or a barren three foot circle. Order text read directly Aug 20; disappearance verified Sep 18 at 8:20 AM and again Sep 21 at 7:45 AM against all three: the order is not among the 42 forest alerts posted this morning, the old alert URL still answers with the Forest Service's own page-not-found body, and the fire restriction page still says every restriction is posted on the alerts page. Three days on, still no published rescission, so the wording here does not change.
Official source: USFS Pike-San Isabel NF
The Forest Service alert list carries a Leadville Ranger District closure of Turquoise Lake Road, County Road 4, due to asphalt damage. The road is barricaded from the Abe Lee parking turnoff to Hagerman Pass. Access to Turquoise Lake is still available via County Road 9C and County Road 9 to the Hagerman Pass intersection, and the Abe Lee fishing site remains open and reachable from CR 4. The alert start date is April 7, 2026 and no end date is posted. It did not affect the three official crew locations for the 2026 Run, which were Outward Bound, Pipeline Alternate and Twin Lakes Village. With the race season over it matters most to anglers and to anyone driving the lake loop, because the through route to Hagerman Pass from the Abe Lee end is gone. It has now been closed for five months with no end date posted. Re-read on the full district alert list Sep 21 at 7:45 AM, unchanged.
Official source: USFS Leadville Ranger District
USFS order 02-12-01-26-19 closes the Interlaken Hotel and Annex area on the Leadville Ranger District from June 22, 2026 at 12:01 AM through June 21, 2028 at 11:59 PM unless rescinded. Entering the described area is prohibited, for public safety in an area with known hazards from tree fall and damaged buildings. The described area is defined only by the map exhibit attached to the order, so where its boundary falls relative to the Colorado Trail is not stated in the order text. If your Twin Lakes plans involve walking out toward Interlaken, call the Leadville Ranger District at 719-486-0749. The order runs to June 2028, so this is a two year condition rather than a seasonal one. Note also that an older district alert from June 12 still says the Dexter House is safe to tour while other buildings should be avoided; the June 22 closure order is the later and stricter document. Re-read on the full district alert list Sep 21 at 7:45 AM, unchanged.
Official source: USFS Leadville Ranger District
The road over Mosquito Pass (13,185 ft) is a rough, high-clearance 4x4 route, typically passable only mid-summer through early fall depending on snow. There is no official live status feed for this county road, so reports from recent travelers and the ranger district are the best sources. No closure or restriction is posted for it on the district alert list as of the full re-read at 7:45 AM Sep 21.
Official source: USFS Leadville Ranger District
Checked each evening against official sources, USFS alerts, InciWeb fire closures, and CDOT. Always verify with the land manager before you go: Pike-San Isabel NF (Leadville Ranger District) · COtrip road conditions (US 24 / CO 91) · CAIC avalanche forecasts (winter).
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