The cold is hanging around today, with no sun to warm things up. The high temperature is expected to top out at a frigid 14 degrees.
At 4 p.m. an air-quality alert was issued for the seven-county metro area.
The high temperature of the day was 11 degrees at 2:30 this morning, and it went down from there. At 4 p.m. the National Weather Service reported it was 7 degrees.
The cold front came in overnight. The Crossroads Men’s Shelter operated by the Salvation Army provided a warm bed for 307 men on Sunday night.
Today, the shelter is open earlier than normal, and the Salvation Army anticipates housing upward of 300 men again tonight.
“The colder and wetter the weather is, the more likely the men will go to the shelter,” Neal Hogan, social services director for the Salvation Army, said in a statement.
The Salvation Army sends out teams on bitterly cold nights to contact the homeless, offering them hot coffee and explaining that Crossroads provides men a warm place to sleep, a shower and hot meal.
The teams also can take women and families to other facilities or a safe place to keep them out of the cold.
Today in the Colorado high country, the north and central mountains should pick up some snow this afternoon and this evening, the weather service said, with light to moderate accumulations.
Vail stands an 80 percent chance of snow today, with daytime accumulations up to 4 inches.
Tonight in Denver, there will be a 40 percent chance of snow, mainly before 10 p.m. The low temperature should be about minus 2 degrees.
Denver’s chill should thaw a bit tomorrow, the weather service reports, with mostly sunny skies and a high temperature near 30 degrees.
By Thursday, skies are forecast to be sunny, and the high temperature should climb into the lower 40s. Friday and Saturday also should be sunny, with high temperatures in the lower 40s.
Kieran Nicholson: 303-954-1822 or knicholson@denverpost.com
