By Matt Gleckman

Don’t take the summer clothes out of storage yet.

Cortez and surrounding area residents were forced to pull on winter boots and jackets and slow down their driving Thursday morning as a result of several inches of wet snow.

"By the time the buses were out there (Thursday morning) the roads were very slick and the visibility was pretty poor," said Mary Ellen Coppinger, director of transportation for Montezuma-Cortez High School. "As a result, most of the buses were running 20 to 25 minutes late."

Despite the slippery road conditions, there were very few weather-related traffic accidents, according to Sgt. Jerry Wiseman of the Colorado State Patrol.

"I worked the last couple of mornings and there were a few cases of property damage," Wiseman said. "However, there were no major accidents or injuries that I know of."

Chris Cuoco, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Grand Junction, stated that the wintry conditions were caused by a strong front that moved in from the Pacific Ocean.

"This was a wet, high-energy storm that cut across southern and central California, Nevada and Utah and then headed just north of the Four Corners area," Cuoco explained. "Cortez and the surrounding areas can expect to receive three to four inches by the storm’s end with a little bit more in the higher elevations.