Severe thunderstorms will be possible over parts of the northern Plains Tuesday which could bring large hail, damaging winds, and possible tornadoes. Thunderstorms with heavy to excessive rainfall may produce flooding over parts of the southern High Plains and North Dakota on Tuesday. Read More >
Overview
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A strong and highly dynamic jet streak pushed across the region, bringing widespread weather impacts to south central and southeastern Colorado. This feature was expected to bring strong winds across the entire region, with downsloping winds off the mountains early, and diurnal mixing through the rest of the day. Along with that, blowing dust was expected across the San Luis Valley and eastern plains given dry antecedent conditions and the strong winds. In addition, high end critical fire weather conditions were expected given the strong winds and humidity values dropping to between 10-15%. While this day was close to becoming NWS Pueblo's first Particularly Dangerous Situation (PDS) RFW day, increasing moisture would limit how low humidity values would fall, so ultimately no PDS RFW day was anticipated. Finally, showers were expected given this pattern, with snow and blowing snow along the mountains, and rain showers for the valleys. These showers were expected to quickly dissipate as they pushed eastward towards the I-25 corridor. Overall, this storm system panned out as expected, with strong winds areawide, blowing dust, and showers for the mountains and valleys. On this day though, showers pushing off the higher terrain and towards the I-25 corridor lasted longer than expected, likely due to the strong dynamics involved with the jet streak and a moisture surge along the nose of the jet streak. This allowed for a corridor of convectively enhanced winds to reach the surface around the Pueblo, Colorado area, with winds gusting up to 70 mph. This caused an area of incredibly localized, but dense, blowing dust to develop just south of Pueblo along the I-25 corridor, which lead to a large and deadly 30+ car pile up. |
 Radar GIF showing the evolution of the showers pushing eastward off the higher terrain and across the I-25 corridor the morning of February 17th, 2026. |
Photos & Video
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| Dust CVD RBG composite from GOES-E, showing blowing dust in bright cream color across portions of eastern Colorado and western Kansas. | A 24 hour snowfall analysis map ending the morning of February 18th, from NOAA's NOHRSC. | Observations from KCPW at Wolf Creek Pass, showing strong winds and blowing snow with visibility limited to less than 1/4 SM at times. | Image of pileup along I-25 corridor south of Pueblo Source: Colorado State Patrol |
Radar
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| Radar GIF showing the evolution of the showers pushing eastward off the higher terrain and across the I-25 corridor the morning of February 17th, 2026. |
Storm Reports
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| Map of all wind LSRs across south central and southeastern Colorado from February, 17th, 2026. |
Environment
A strong and dynamic jet stream pushed into the region, bringing a multitude of impactful weather to south central and southeastern Colorado, ranging from blowing snow to the mountains and blowing dusts and strong winds to the plains.
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| Figure 1: 300 mb pattern at 10 AM MST February 17th. | Figure 2: 500 mb pattern at 10 AM MST February 17th. | Figure 3: 750 mb pattern at 10 AM MST February 17th. |
Near-storm environment summary.
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| Figure 4: Low-level Lapse Rates at 10 AM MST February 17th. | Figure 5: RAP sounding of the environment near to the time of the blowing dust across the I-25 corridor just south of Pueblo, Colorado. |
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