Call me the breeze; I keep blowing down the road

"You find out the strength of a wind by trying to walk against it, not by lying down."

___ C. S. Lewis

 

 

Adjust your sails for a change in direction 

 

By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com

 

The closer to the edge, the more the wind blows. Most of the time, I try to "be the wind." Living in Wyoming as I did, and later on the Palmer Divide, one becomes accustomed that particular natural phenomena. Sort of like Evel Knievel, I learned to love the feeling of fresh air on my face and the wind blowing through my hair. Even when there was more of it. 

 

The Palmer Divide wind could be dangerous and destructive. Wind blow-ups — legendary.

Traveling south out of downtown Denver and  over the Palmer Divide, the elevation increases by more than 2,000 feet.

"When the wind rocks this ridge out of the north, snow amounts can be huge compared to other locations," says CBS Denver.

"A north wind is an upslope flow for the Palmer Divide, which helps to enhance precipitation."

Twice during the half century of ice harvesting on the lake in Monument, high winds destroyed the ice houses where the blocks where stored. 

 

Once, on Dec. 31, 1909, a 75- to 100-mile-an-hour west wind destroyed the icehouses on the day before the harvest was to start. The structures were rebuilt. Then, again, in 1943, another west wind blew down the icehouses, heavy timbers and all. It was reported that 2” x 4”s from the icehouse were embedded in the side wall of a house on Second Street. Photo above at top is the second Doyle icehouse, about 1930. The second photo is of the first icehouse on Monument Lake.

“A god-awful strong wind came through this part of the country and it blew parts and pieces all over the place,” recalls Bill Simpson. “For years afterward, anytime someone had a flat tire where they picked up a nail or chunk of metal, they would turn the blame to those icehouses.”

The high winds came before, of course,  to Monument on Jan. 4, 1916.

 

Workers dressed in winter clothes pose on a Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph Company truck in Monument in El Paso County.  Wires, equipment, and a lamp hang from the truck with a sign reading: "American Telephone and Telegraph Co. and Associated Companies, Long Distance Telephone, Bell System." A worker hangs from a telephone pole in the distance in these Colorado Historical Society photos from  Mountain States Telephone collection.

 

View of broken utility poles in a field in Monument, with telephone wires are draped on the ground, shows a barbed wire fence and open field.

 

In the same storm, a Denver and Rio Grande Railroad Company railroad car tipped over on the embankment in Monument. The Monument train depot is in the distance. 

Trouble pegging local weather for hundreds of years

Winter forecast from an informed, rank amateur

By Rob Carrigan, rob.carrigan@pikespeaknewspapers.com


It is time for my winter weather forecast. You are going to say, “Too early,” or something like “Killjoy,” but I like to still be in my shorts while making prognostications about open automobile ski season here on the Divide. I have been caught before. Ski Monument Hill.

After all, I was still in my shorts in October, almost 20 years ago, the day before one of the worst storms in this area in human memory. In Palmer Lake, the storm that began Friday afternoon, Oct. 24, and snowed almost non-stop until Sunday morning Oct. 26, dropped a recorded 52 inches in Palmer Lake, with drifts of 15 feet. Monument was not far behind with 48 inches recorded, and Woodland Park’s and Colorado Spring’s two feet, each, made it difficult to get around.

“The scope and length of blizzard conditions proved fatal for several eastern Coloradans. Three people in El Paso county perished from carbon monoxide poisoning after waiting for help to come in their snowbound vehicles for over 24 hours. Another person froze to death in a vehicle on post at Fort Carson in the Colorado Springs area. An elderly women in Otero County tried to walk home after her vehicle became stuck in open country. She froze to death. A man in Bent county froze to death in open country while hunting, or looking for other hunters. Another man died in a vehicle accident in Pueblo during the blizzard Friday night,” reported the National Weather Service (NOAA) in Pueblo.

“Many people were injured during the blizzard. Two people were injured in Colorado Springs when a canopy at a gas station collapsed under the weight of deep snow on top. Another canopy at a gas station in Lamar collapsed, but no one was injured. A vehicle was destroyed, though,” NOAA said.

“Thousands of people were stranded in eastern Colorado, and hundreds had to be rescued from their snowbound vehicles. By Saturday, the Governor declared a State of Emergency. Emergency traffic only was allowed on eastern Colorado roadways. Rescues were made by the U.S. Army in Humvees and by helicopter, the National Guard, law enforcement, other public resources, and private citizens. The combination of high wind and heavy snow caused power lines to come down,” they reported.

For hundreds of years, folks have had trouble pegging the weather here on the Divide.

Partly because of the way the Orographic lift works for regions along the Palmer Divide, much as it does in all the mountains on the Continental Divide, just on a smaller (but surprising scale.)

“One of the things that makes Colorado weather so interesting is the effect our terrain has on the weather. You often hear TV Meteorologists say the mountains are getting hammered with snow while we have a warm, dry, windy day down in Denver and along the front range. This all stems from Orographic Lift… the less nerdy/technical term for this is ‘upslope’ or ‘upslope flow.’ As moisture laden air streams in from the West and is forced to rise over the mountains, it eventually cools and becomes saturated, causing rain or snow to fall. As the air moves over the mountains and down the leeward side it warms and drys out. This is a common pattern we see with Colorado storms moving in from the West all the time, but the same effect happens for cities along the Palmer Divide,” says Castle Rock stormchaser and meteorologist John R. Braddock, at Mountain Wave Weather.

The Palmer Divide, or Palmer Ridge, of course is the elevated section of land composed of bluffs and ridges and the rising terrain sloping up from Castle Rock south toward Larkspur, with continuing elevation rise, finally peaking at Monument Hill.

“It separates the Arkansas and Missouri River Basins in Eastern Colorado and roughly runs from its Western point in Palmer Lake, East roughly 80 miles to near Limon. The uplifting of the terrain in these areas causes the weather to behave differently, in fact storms can behave considerably differently from Denver to Castle Rock or Denver to Colorado Springs,” says Braddock.

But what about this year, you ask?

I am no expert, but I suggest you watch for slow-moving storms out of New Mexico. Winds moving backwards on the clock, or southeasterly, have trapped some mean storms against the Palmer Divide in my experience, sometimes for days. Albuquerque Low, I think they call it.

I also pay attention to the long range forecasts from the Old Farmer’s Almanac. After all, you can’t survive since 1792, and be wrong consistently. Here is what they say for our upcoming weather.

“Winter will be warmer than normal, with slightly above-normal precipitation. The coldest periods will be from late November into early December and from late December into early January. Snowfall will be below normal in the north and above in the south, with the snowiest periods in mid- and late November, mid- to late December, and early to mid-March. April and May will be cooler than normal, with precipitation a bit above normal.”

Probably though, I can stay in my shorts for a few more days, at least until October.

Photo Information: The winter of 1913 also had a brutal blizzard in the Monument area.

Storms never last, or do they?

Charles Michael Fagan, a muleskinner with that expedition, froze to death in that storm trying to recover horses and mules spooked by the severe weather

By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com

Life is for one generation. A good name (or a bad one) is forever. The area known as “the Divide” has a historically strong name or reputation for inclement Colorado weather. The May snowstorm last year serves as a reminder that at almost any time of year, we might be able to expect frosty conditions.
Recall recent history with the blizzard of October of 1997 when nearly 300 people needed refuge from the storm and spent most of the weekend in the Falcon Inn and the Monument Town Hall. Rescue workers worked non-stop for days and some nearby areas spent the next week digging out.
But it has carried that reputation for a long time.
Lee Whiteley’s excellent 1999 book, “The Cherokee Trail, Bent’s Old Fort to Fort Bridger,” considers the unpredictability of weather here as it related to early pioneers traveling the Cherokee Trail through “the Pinery” or Black Forest as it is known today.
“Bad weather conditions were a real problem for trail travelers. Although most of the travel through eastern Colorado was during the spring and summer months, violent storms could occur at any time,” he wrote.
As early as 1842, Rufus Sage noted the same problem. “The country hearabouts … is much subject to storms of rain, hail, snow, and wind, - and it is rarely a person can pass through it without being caught by a storm of some kind.”
And get caught, they did.
Capt. Randolph B. Marcy’s expedition through the area in 1858 is a well-known example.
“This is a locality which is very subject to severe storms, and it is here that I encountered the most severe snow-storm that I have ever known, on the first day of May, 1858. I would advise travelers to hasten past this spot as rapidly as possible during the winter and spring months, as a storm might prove very serious here,” Marcy wrote and Whiteley include that account in his book.
“It was a mild and pleasant spring day, with no appearance of bad weather, but as night approached it became cloudy, and about dark a snow storm set in accompanied by a violent gale of wind from the north, which increased until it became a perfect tempest, and continued without cessation for sixty hours.”
Charles Michael Fagan, a muleskinner with that expedition, froze to death in that storm trying to recover horses and mules spooked by the severe weather. His grave on the trail at the base of Point of Rocks became a landmark for generations that followed.
Fagan was not the only one to lose their life in a severe storm on “the Divide.”
Mrs. A.C. Hunt wrote the following on June 25, 1859 in her journal.
“Traveled 15 miles to a pine forest – very beautiful but sad from number of graves here – 8 are in view of persons who have frozen to death, one as late as June Third, ’59. The changes are so sudden even in the summer that from being warm it will be so cold as to benumb the body before fire can be made to warm it.”
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