Weather
A sharp midweek change will flip the Northern Rockies from spring warmth into a colder, windier storm from Wednesday through Friday. Confidence is strongest from Wednesday morning through Friday night, when most areas see their main shot of snow, snow levels fall from roughly 6,000-7,000 feet toward 3,000-5,000 feet, and the favored higher terrain in the Tetons, southwest Montana, and west-central Idaho reaches 1-2 feet. After that, the weekend looks cooler with scattered mountain showers and much lighter accumulations, while next week still leans somewhat active but with lower confidence on exact storm timing and placement.
Tuesday still looks like the last warm spring day, with ski-elevation temperatures mostly in the 40s to low 50s before a sharp change arrives late Tuesday night and Wednesday. The models are tightly clustered on the front timing, the wind ramp, and the first drop in snow levels, so confidence is good on a windy transition day. Expect southwest to west gusts of 25-40 mph at many ski elevations, with stronger exposed ridges, and expect snow levels to start high enough for mixed lower-elevation precipitation in some zones before colder air catches up. Early storm snow looks fairly dense, with SLRs mostly in the 7-10 range on Wednesday.
From Wednesday night through Friday, the guidance stays well aligned on a colder backside phase, although the spread opens a bit on where the steadiest lingering bands set up. Snow levels continue lowering into roughly 3,000-5,000 feet by Thursday and Friday, while temperatures settle into the 20s and low 30s at ski elevations. That should improve snow quality into a more moderate 10-14 SLR range, with some 14+ snow in the colder higher terrain late in the storm. The Tetons, southwest Montana, and parts of west-central Idaho are favored for the best storm totals, broadly in the 8-18 inches range with the top terrain near 1-2 feet, while northwest Montana and far north Idaho mostly stay closer to 1-4 inches.
After Friday, the models generally agree on a cooler, lower-impact weekend, then diverge quickly next week on timing, intensity, snow levels, and wind. That supports a forecast with scattered mountain snow showers, longer dry breaks, and lighter winds through the weekend rather than another organized storm right away. The broader pattern still leans somewhat wetter than normal into next week, but the realistic mountain-scale outcome is still modest for now: many areas may only see minor refreshes, while the highest terrain has an outside shot at another 3-8 inches if a later wave consolidates.
Resort Forecast Totals (Wed Apr 22 – Fri Apr 24)
- Grand Targhee – 15-24 in
- Bogus Basin – 12-17 in
- Big Sky – 10-15 in
- Jackson Hole – 9-14 in
- Brundage – 9-12 in
- Bridger Bowl – 6-9 in
- Tamarack – 6-8 in
- Whitefish Mountain – 3-4 in
- Schweitzer – 1-2 in
- Sun Valley – 1-2 in
