{"id":29710,"date":"2024-01-15T15:15:00","date_gmt":"2024-01-15T22:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-weather-cold-and-snow-shut-down-mountain-roads-cancel-flights-and-close-schools\/"},"modified":"2024-01-15T22:15:00","modified_gmt":"2024-01-15T22:15:00","slug":"colorado-weather-cold-and-snow-shut-down-mountain-roads-cancel-flights-and-close-schools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-weather-cold-and-snow-shut-down-mountain-roads-cancel-flights-and-close-schools\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorado weather: Cold and snow shut down mountain roads, cancel flights and close schools"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Cars
Cars drive on I-70 near the Eisenhower Tunnel as a polar vortex covered Colorado with arctic air and snow on Sunday. (Hart Van Denburg\/CPR News)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The winter storm that has blanketed Colorado with brutally cold arctic air and snow continued Monday, ensnaring mountain traffic, canceling flights and closing schools.<\/p>\n

The National Weather Service issued a Winter Storm Warning and a Wind Chill Warning for the central mountains, southern Colorado, the Front Range and the Eastern Plains Monday. Heavy snowfall was expected in the mountains. Wind speeds on the plains were expected to be above 50 mph, which could lead to temperatures of at least 20-degrees below zero. Both warnings were in effect until Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re seeing there\u2019s still snow continuing (in) the mountains, foothills, and even portions of the plains right now,\u201d said Caitlyn Mensch, a forecaster at the National Weather Service in Boulder. \u201cWe\u2019re seeing that there\u2019s very hazardous travel conditions right now, especially in the mountain passes. So, if you can avoid travel up there, it\u2019d be definitely advised.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the Western Slope, heavy snow was expected to continue, though gradually lightening up by the end of the day. Though the end of falling snow didn\u2019t signal the end of winter hazards. The NWS posted to X, formerly Twitter, cautioning drivers to be wary of icy roads and increased avalanche risks.<\/p>\n

Traffic and road conditions<\/div>\n

Several highways were closed in the central mountains, including I-70, I-25 and numerous mountain passes, according to the Colorado Department of Transportation\u2019s COTrip website.<\/p>\n

Lisa Schwantes, the regional communications manager for CDOT in southwest Colorado, said the storm was impacting travel in the high country from Southwest Colorado up the Western Slope and the I-70 corridor.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we are dealing with is just frigid, frigid temperatures, cold and high winds. And of course that just causes white out conditions blowing snow and low visibility, zero visibility,\u201d Schwantes said.<\/p>\n

The Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend is one of the busiest traffic weekends in the mountains, as people travel to and from ski resorts. But with heavy snow affecting the roads, traffic in many areas was at a standstill.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re in your car and you\u2019re at a standstill, stay in your vehicle. Turn it off and on periodically to keep the heat going a bit, but save your gas, [and hope] that these safety closures don\u2019t last more than an hour or two,\u201d said Schwantes.<\/p>\n

The length of a closure depends on several factors, Schwantes said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just depends on what Mother Nature is throwing our way. It depends on what type of slide-offs of other vehicles is occurring ahead of you and the equipment needed to turn those vehicles the right direction,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Flights at DIA<\/div>\n

At Denver International Airport, nearly 350 flights were canceled on Monday, according to the flight tracking website FlightAware. Over 550 flights were delayed, as of Monday afternoon.<\/p>\n

School closures<\/div>\n

Several school districts and universities announced they\u2019d cancel classes on Tuesday, due to the weather.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dangerous weather continues Monday on Front Range<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29711,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[120,28,1164],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-29710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-colorado","tag-headlines","tag-snow"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29710","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29710\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29710"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=29710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}