DENVER — It might still be the heart of August, but we're only a couple weeks away from Denver's earliest recorded snowfall.
As of Wednesday, there are only 16 days until September 3rd, the date of Denver's earliest snowfall in recorded history. And it wasn't a small snowstorm, either.
A whopping 4.2 inches of snow fell on September 3, 1961 - the earliest recorded snowfall in Denver's recorded history, which dates back to the late 1800s. That snowfall actually came before Labor Day that year, making the unofficial end of summer an exceptionally wintry sight.
More recently, many of you will probably remember the stunning temperature drop last year in early September 2020, which took a 101-degree high on September 5 (Denver's latest 100-degree temperature on record) and flipped to an inch of snow just 72 hours later on September 8.
That said, early September snowfall is highly unusual, and in fact, recent trends have pointed to less September snowfall. Last year's Denver snowfall was the first measurable snowfall in the month of September since 2000, based on records at the city's Central Park station.
Denver's average first snowfall is on October 18, so most likely, we've still got several more weeks until snow flies around town. But it's not impossible that we get snow in the next few weeks, as history has shown.
And in the meantime, some of the mountains are likely getting their first taste of winter this week.
