Fading winter storm leaves behind more than three feet of snow

A storm system that dumped meters of wet, heavy snow on Colorado this week is moving on as counties south and east of Denver continue to emerge from the slush.

Flakes continue to fall between Denver International Airport and the southeast side of the metro area, but Saturday morning Zach Hiris, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service's Boulder office, said the snow was expected to taper off by the end of the day across most of the state.

“We're pretty much in the last gasp of the storm this morning,” he said.

The Palmer Divide area south of Denver and Lincoln County experienced the worst of the storm, with up to 40 inches of snow accumulating along the Palmer Divide and about 38 inches of snow in rural Genoa, according to Hiris. In the Denver area, communities received anywhere from a few inches to more than a foot of snow.

Capt. Michael Yowell of the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office said rescue operations were underway in the rural region east of Colorado Springs as of 10 a.m., with abandoned cars blocking snowplows and at least two heavy equipment operators stranded after trying to dig out drivers who had hit them used county roads to avoid highway closures.

“Buldozers are stuck in this thing trying to get to a Honda Civic that's buried over the roof,” Yowell said. “It was a one-two punch from Mother Nature that we took right in the chin.”

Although no people or animals were found dead, Yowell said parts of the county remained inaccessible to local rescuers and members of the Colorado National Guard mobilized by Gov. Jared Polis. Yowell added that many motorists were moved to warming shelters during the storm and the unincorporated community of Karval has been without power since Friday evening.

“The snow is just so wet and so heavy. It's like a spring snowstorm that we experience in the first half of November. “It’s one of those storms where you just have to make a run for it,” he said.