Traffic cameras along Loveland Pass captured a trace of snow falling on the Continental Divide Friday morning.
That’s right. Snow. On June 30.
Around 9:15 a.m., Denver7 traffic expert Jayson Luber spotted the summer snowfall on the CDOT camera atop the pass.
Can it snow in Colorado every month? Yes, yes it can. It is snowing right now, June 30th, at the continental divide along US 6 on Loveland Pass. pic.twitter.com/053numSNRl
— Jayson Luber (@Denver7Traffic) June 30, 2023
The top of Loveland Pass has an elevation of nearly 12,000 feet.
Snow in June in the mountains is not uncommon. On June 8-9, 2020, a “macroburst” storm dumped several inches across a large swath of the high country and a whopping 15 inches in the city of Gould in the Northern Rockies.
According to this map from the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Association, several weather stations have, several weather stations have recorded snow on June 30. Weather stations in Clear Creek County and El Paso County saw an inch of snow on June 30, 1995. Stations in Winter Park and Boulder County recorded snow on June 30, 1945.
Snow in July and August is rare, even in the high country. According to this Summit Daily article, though, snow fell above 11,000 feet on Loveland Pass on July 20, 2013.
In one of the rarest weather anomalies in state history, snow actually fell in Denver in the early morning hours of July 17, 1872, according to NWS Boulder. It’s the only record of snowfall in July in Denver, and it doesn’t appear on the city’s official records, as those didn’t begin until 1882.
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