More than 21 inches of snow is expected at the Colorado summit and up to 18 inches at the resort

Winter slope sports enthusiasts, fear not – snow is on its way to Colorado.

According to the National Weather Service, up to 12 inches (30 cm) of snow is expected in southwest Colorado this week, with a total of about 2 to 4 inches (5 to 10 cm) of snow expected on mountains elsewhere. There isn't much snow in most of the state's resorts. However, the colder temperatures that continue to prevail may mean that it starts to snow in some ski areas. As for when the snow will fall, you can expect the flakes to fall Friday through Sunday.

Joel Gratz's OpenSnow report confirms that prediction, calling for up to 18 inches of snow in Silverton and double-digit totals in other southwest Colorado ski resorts. However, Gratz also predicts that the central mountain regions will only see a few inches (see his full breakdown by resort here).

Mountain-Forecast.com's report for the state's 14-year-olds provides additional information – Longs Peak, for example, is expected to rise about 2.5 centimeters on Wednesday, followed by about 15 centimeters on Saturday. Pikes Peak could rise about 20 centimeters between Friday evening and Saturday. However, the weather forecast service also points out that southwest Colorado will see the heaviest snow – Mount Sneffels near Telluride is expected to see about three inches of snow in a storm Wednesday evening, followed by about 21 inches Friday night into Saturday morning.

Of those three forecasts, the National Weather Service report calls for the least amount of snowfall. Still, storms are still days away and a lot can change.

The statewide snowpack is currently around 36 percent of the previous average from October 15th. While most of the state has little to no snow, the Yampa-White-Little Snake River Basin in northwestern Colorado has snowpack at 104 percent -date median and the Gunnison River Basin in southwestern Colorado and the San Miguel-Dolores- Animas-San Juan River Basin are also above their norms at 254 percent of the current median and 1,188 percent of the current median, respectively. Keep in mind, however, that current snowpack numbers are still quite low, meaning these percent-to-median comparisons will likely see wide fluctuations in the coming days and weeks.

For more weather information, visit the National Weather Service website.