Weather

[MOworkCOplay]

So I’m looking at the forecasts for next week and every day has rain, but I figure that’s pretty typical.
I’m trying to narrow down days that look best to go. Is PM Thunderstorms better or worse then Scattered Thunderstorms?

[MOworkCOplay]

I’m guessing I have no responses bc this is a vague/stupid question.
So, if the weather starts showing rain at 9 am...do you show up at 3 am to hike or pull that day from being a possibility?

[Aphelion]

Eh, that's on you to decide. The forecast is a loose guideline at best. You may find the other current weather thread answers your question: viewtopic.php?t=56569&p=689570#p689570

[MOworkCOplay]

Thanks!

[Mtnman200]

Start early and be on your way down long before bad weather hits. Every afternoon in monsoon season is likely to have a decent chance of thunderstorms.

[MOworkCOplay]

Believe it or not I study weather and that’s how I know how absurd I sound. I just don’t study Colorado weather. I have pulled up the long range forecast that the meteorologist use to predict weather and it just doesn’t look favorable. BUT, I KNOW Midwest weather patterns and not mountain patterns. It looks like a setup that rotates around the 4 corners and my guess is this is monsoon season, but next Saturday (our scheduled hike day), shows overcast all day. My problem is I don’t know what’s normal nor have I studied enough for the mountain weather.

[pfiore1]

The vast majority of the first many peaks I climbed in summers back in the 90's were done mostly late afternoon, after the the afternoon storms. I would wake up at 10am or later, usually later, start hiking at noon or later, run up to treeline smoking cigarettes by 2pm or later, then wait for all the other hikers to run down the mountain escaping lightning, then the storm would clear by 3 or 4pm and I would head up to the top. Summit alone by 5-6pm then down before the sun set or watch the sunset on the top. But I was a young dude living in Leadville in the 90's, that should speak for itself. Disclaimer...don't do that, don't follow my poor example, start at like 2am or earlier.

[MOworkCOplay]

Haha! My last message to the girls was, “Do you trust me” in an Aladdin voice! I will be that person that shows up at 2 am!

I planned this trip a year ago, after I summited Quandary. We’ve made a vacation out of this trip, but I mean serious business. This vaca was for only one reason. I will forego drinking and all the plans to summit. I just hope my friends understand how serious I am.

[polar]

I try to read the forecast discussion on weather.gov, get a feel if the weather is caused by the typical thermal activity in the summer time, or is caused by a front. If it's your typical thermal activity, then start early and be off the mountain by noon is a good rule of thumb to follow. If it's caused by a weather front moving in, then the timing of the front becomes very important.

The problem with mountain weather is that there can be localized storm that cannot be predicted by large area forecast models. Once I got caught in a lightning storm at 8:30am on the summit of a 14er, when the weather forecast was your typical summer forecast of 30% chance of thunderstorm in the PM. Even half an hour before the storm the sky was still blue.

[mountain_man]

I try to read the forecast discussion on weather.gov, get a feel if the weather is caused by the typical thermal activity in the summer time, or is caused by a front. If it's your typical thermal activity, then start early and be off the mountain by noon is a good rule of thumb to follow. If it's caused by a weather front moving in, then the timing of the front becomes very important.

The problem with mountain weather is that there can be localized storm that cannot be predicted by large area forecast models. Once I got caught in a lightning storm at 8:30am on the summit of a 14er, when the weather forecast was your typical summer forecast of 30% chance of thunderstorm in the PM. Even half an hour before the storm the sky was still blue.

This is the answer I was going to say.

I too got caught in a thunderstorm around 9:00 am. We saw lightning probably 20 miles away, but our skies were blue. Not an hour later the surrounding area was being pelted with rain, graupel and (luckily) in-cloud lightning. They can come up fast. This is a cool site for checking modeled soundings: http://www.twisterdata.com/. You can better gauge the instability via their soundings. However, completely trusting model data in the middle of the mountains with no in-situ measurements to feed into it might not be the best choice anyone has ever made.

Safe travels.

[MOworkCOplay]

Great advice! I think I understand the fronts moving in. It looks like the weather prediction is using terminology of PM Thunderstorms for the typical afternoon storms and Scattered Thunderstorms for a moving front of storms. I noticed they used that terminology today and could see it this morning moving across CO.
They have already changed next Saturday back to having storms arrive at noon vs 9am. It’s ever changing. I also pulled up the GFS model runs and they now show much more clearing on Saturday vs yesterday. So, I guess I just will roll with it and gauge it the night before and morning of. Then when we get there we’ll just have to keep our eyes on the sky. This is the most unpredictable weather and I don’t think I could accurately know for sure anyways.

[ronbco]

Is there any guidance (not wild guesses) for when to bail off a ridge due to risk of lightening? Or if it is best to avoid or go onto snowfields when an electrical storm is in progress?

After 30+ years and 100+ summits I've only experienced static from a storm twice, but this past weekend when it happened it motivated me to at least look into more info. I was descending on a ridge with about 45 min of travel time still needed. I could easily bail off one side but did not want to (because it was loose) or know how far to go down. I experienced mild static in my hands and on my helmet. I dumped my pack on the ground quickly, descended a few feet below the ridge, crouched, extracted my trekking pole and threw it away (opportunity: 20 yr old trekking pole, free to anyone, on the ridge going up to Drift peak), took off my helmet and stowed it in my pack (and then felt my limited hair standing on end). Then we hustled down the ridge in crouched posture.

I've heard that a pole might actually reduce strike risk based on the electromagnetic effect. I was surprised that a plastic helmet brought on more static but my physicist son said any sphere can cause that. But is static a sure indicator that it is serious time? Maybe small static discharges are reducing the risk?
I'm assuming that traveling in a squat posture is prudent. But I don't know if traveling to get at the end of the ridge quickly itself is ill advised or if I should have bailed off the ridge and waited or risked the loose hillside traverse.

I'm guessing there is no real science or experience can help with this it's worth asking the community. I don't suppose there is anyone that has tried a variety of strategies and observed (and survived) results.