Colorado weather: Feet of snow for the mountains, Denver will see heavy rain

A dramatic weather change is on the horizon for Colorado. Tuesday will bring a powerful, moisture laden system to our state. Heavy snow will fill in through the day in our mountains and foothills. Many western mountains will pick up anywhere from 8 to 14 inches of snow. Winter Weather Advisories are in place through Wednesday morning.

The Front Range mountains and parts of the foothills are in for a big shot of snow as well. Winter Storm Warnings start on Tuesday and last through Wednesday afternoon.

Most foothill and mountain areas could see 8 to 16 inches of snow, but some high elevation areas of Park and Clear Creek counties could see up to 2 feet of snow.

The Denver area and plains should mainly stay on the rainy side. We expect periods of heavy rain through the late afternoon and evening. The tricky part of the forecast is whether or not the rain changes over to snow on Tuesday night into Wednesday morning for the Denver area. We may stay too warm for that to happen. If we do change over to snow, a few inches of wet snow are possible. If not, we will just continue to see rain through early Wednesday morning before breaking up quite a bit by noon on Wednesday.

By Wednesday afternoon, the bulk of the moisture shifts into southeastern Colorado before clearing on Thursday.