24 Mar 2010 - Spring Snow Storm Denver

Yesterday, Helen was flying back from Tennessee after helping her mom move to Knoxville. She was due to arrive at 5:17PM. A massive spring snow storm was predicted for the front range including Denver to start around 3-6PM. At noon it was clear at our house in the mtns and looking at www.cotrig.org it appeared to still be pretty nice in the Denver area. I had originally scheduled service for our Prius but elected to cancel it and drive our 4WD Explorer down. Good decision.

On the way down, it appeared that my telephone was not working and the battery was low. Knowing that Hele would call me when she landed, I stopped by a Verizon store to have them check out my phone. The told me that it would not charge. Being short on time, I used one of their phones to leave Helen a message that my phone wasn't working and I would wait at our usual spot for her. As I was waiting the phone rang and Helen informed me that her flight had been deverted to Colorado Springs. I quickly told her that my phone battery was about to go and that I would drive to our friends (Mike and Susan Rudd) and she should call Mike to let him know her status.

After about 1 hr of driving through the snow storm (normally takes about 15 minutes), I arrived at Mike's house. Helen just called and said the plane was scheduled to fly back to Denver airport. I turned around and headed back out to the airport. The snow storm which was really getting bad and winter driving conditions. As I was about 3 miles from the airport, Helen called (I had Mikes cell phone), to let me know that the were returning to the gate and would probably have to spend the night in Colorado Springs.

I then headed back to Mike and Susan's house. Another hour of driving in a massive snow storm.

Roads to the mountains were closed and Mike and Susan let me stay at their house.

This morning Helen was able to catch an early morning flight back to Denver. I headed out to the airport again. Roads were much better shape and I70 was open again. We did have a lot of wet slush on the road but made it home safely around noon. At our house, we only had about 3-4 inches but in the front range some areas reported 23" and many areas had over 10".

That's Colorado in the spring time. Within a couple days, all the snow will be gone in the Denver area and spring will continue until the next snow storm.

This is a photo of our Explorer this morning parked outside Mike's garage. Click HERE to view other photos taken this morning of the snow storm.