We started out and ended the year with severe winter weather. High winds and snow storms toppled power poles, blew trucks over and caused numerous auto accidents in January, April, November and December.
Avalanches took the lives of 2 backcountry skiers in January and yet another overconfident Aspen skier was done in by an avalanche in the Highland Bowl out-of-bounds area in February. A skier was injured in an avalanche in East Vail in the same chute that killed 1 and injured 3 in 2014. A skier was injured in a self-triggered avalanche on Berthoud Pass in May. In November 2 skiers in the San Juans survived an avalanche and a man was injured in an avalanche near Berthoud Pass. In December, 2 backcountry skiers survived an avalanche they triggered near Breckenridge.
The winter and spring months alternated between huge snowstorms and record warmth in February and March. The warm, dry weather produced a few small wildfires but the record wet conditions in May and June put a damper on Colorado wildfires in 2015. Things were much different on the west coast were record, massive wildfires sent smoke that turned our Colorado blue skies so brown that the state issued air health advisories.
May was a record wet month for Colorado, followed by daily rain all the way through June. Flooding of streets and fields was widespread throughout Colorado along rivers and creeks. Bear Creek reservoir rose 35 feet, more than the 2013 floods.
A NORMALLY DRY DRAINAGE NEAR MORRISON IN MAY
River runners couldn't resist the high waters and paid the price. 11 people drowned rafting or tubing on rivers all across Colorado. 4 people drowned swimming in lakes or reservoirs. One man drowned fly fishing in Boulder Creek. 2 people drowned after falling through thin ice and an entire elk herd in Pagosa Springs disappeared after the ice gave way.
There were several very localized, high intensity, damaging hail storms. A short stretch of I-25 was closed in Colorado Springs by 8 inches of hail in May. 4 feet of hail hit in an isolated one block area of Denver in June. The photos are very strange indeed of a front end loader removing hail from the street, a yard on one side of the street buried in hail and a yard on the opposite side of the street green grass. In July, an unreported incident of 2 feet of damaging hail hit an isolated block of 6 houses in my neighborhood.
40 people in Colorado were struck by lightning in 2015, the most for records dating back to 1980. May - A teen in Aurora was struck by lightning while walking home from school and remains in a coma. A jogger seeking shelter under a tree was struck and hospitalized. June - 5 construction workers were struck in Colorado Springs. 6 people were struck on Pike's Peak. 15 people were struck by lightning and a dog killed near Mt Bierstadt. One person was struck during a cricket match in Colorado Springs. Lightning struck a home in Colorado Springs and started a fire. July - A 71 year-old man struck by lightning in Golden Gate Canyon is saved by CPR from his wife. 4 teens in Aurora were injured when lightning struck a tree near a swimming pool. A newly wed couple and their friends were struck by lightning near Mt. Yale. The new bride was killed and her husband was in critical condition airlifted to a hospital. August - A motorcyclist in Aurora was struck by lightning and crashed with serious injuries.
Wet weather always produces rockslides, mudslides and other landslides. A rockslide in Bear Creek Canyon closed Hwy 73 between Morrison and Kittredge in March. May - A mudslide reached the yard of some homes on Table Mesa in Golden. A rockslide in Big Thompson Canyon closed the road. A mudslide closed Hwy 50 near Salida. A rockslide hit Manitou Springs. June- Several landslides hit the Rockrimmon area in Colorado Springs. Another slide knocked trailers off their foundations in Colorado Springs. A landslide hit the Colorado Springs Zoo and the animals had to be relocated. A rockslide closed I-70 near Hanging Lake tunnel in Glenwood Canyon. A mudslide closed I-70 near Grand Junction in July and a rockslide hit 2 trucks in Glenwood Canyon in November.
A hiker died after falling off Blodgett Peak near Colorado Springs in March. A rock climber was injured in Poudre Canyon in March. A trail runner in Boulder was severely injured when a large rock rolled over him in May. June- A man was injured after falling off Snowmass Mountain near the summit. August- A man was injured after falling off Pyramid Peak. 2 concert goers at Red Rocks fell trying to free climb the rocks - one died, the other was seriously injured. September - A prominent Texas surgeon died after falling off Crestone Needle and a man was injured after falling from Pike's Peak
Tornadoes were few and far between in 2015 but there was a rare EF3 tornado in June near Berthoud..
A bear bit campers in a Durango park in May. June - In Snowmass, a grandpa wakes up from a snooze on the porch with his foot in a bear's mouth. Several incidents of bears opening a car door, getting into the car and destroying the interior trying to get out. This happens a lot and makes me wonder why bears, smart enough to figure out how to open a car door, decide to close the door when they get in, and then can't figure out how to open the door from the inside, panic and destroy the car trying to get out. It was a record year for bear problems along the Front Range because the overly wet spring weather ruined berry and acorn crops. There were 4 incidents of bears rummaging through garbage that were shot and killed by angry homeowners.
Large animal incidents were down in 2015. A woman in Steamboat Springs walking her dogs was hospitalized after being head-butted by a moose in February. Randy, rutting elk rammed a few cars in October and an elk in Rocky Mountain National Park sent a selfie-seeking tourist to the hospital after it used its antlers to hurl him 30 feet through the air to a rough landing. There were numerous incidents of motorcycle crashes with deer or elk causing serious injuries or death.
The usual number of mountain lion sightings were reported in 2015 with one highly unusual Colorado mountain lion discovered to have walked all the way to Connecticut! The usual number of pets being consumed by mountain lions were reported as well as the tracking and killing of the offending young cougars. There were a few hero dog stories. An amazingly brave Chihuahua in Longmont treed a mountain lion in February. In June, a Golden Retriever was injured defending his family from a moose attack near Boulder. 2 dogs hiking with their owners in Deer Creek Canyon were bit by rattlesnakes. There were 2 incidents of hikers bit by rattlesnakes in 2015. The owner of a small dog in Grand Junction literally snatched victory from the jaws of defeat when he rescued his dog from the mouth of a mountain lion.
The wet weather caused disease transmission from wildlife to humans to increase dramatically in 2015. Prairie dog colonies up and down the Front Range tested positive for plague. 6 cases of human plague were reported in Colorado in 2015, 4 of whom died. A dog in eastern Colorado's Phillips County contracted a rare form of plague from fleas on prairie dogs and then transmitted it to the dog's owner and 2 other men - all died. A 16 year-old high schooler in Fort Collins also died of plague. In August, a 7 year old girl contracted plague on a camping trip in southerm Colorado. In September, a woman visiting Salida contracted plague. Officials estimated up to 1/3 of Colorado's bird population was killed by West Nile. There were 101 human cases of West Nile with 2 deaths. 12 horses were diagnosed with West Nile this year. A record-breaking 46 human cases of tularemia were reported with half in the Fort-Collins-Greeley- Boulder triangle. Most of the cases seem to have been caused by contact with rabbit nesting areas.
Unrelated to wet weather, a number of small earthquakes were recorded near Trinidad in 2015, most likely associated with an oil field wastewater injection well. Some small earthquakes were also recorded in the Paonia-Grand Junction vicinity.
