Colorado Sports and Recreation: Late Season Moisture Buoys 2013 Rafting Season Hopes for Colorado’s River Outfitters

The combination of Colorado’s recent late-season snow and rainfall is giving the state’s rafting industry high hopes for a successful season. With April’s snow boosting snowpack across the state and delaying the start of seasonal runoff, the Colorado River Outfitters Association (CROA) is predicting a normal start to this year’s rafting season, which typically runs mid-May through mid-September.

According to CROA’s 2012 Economic Impact Study, Colorado’s rafting industry had a more than $127 million economic impact on the state’s tourism industry in 2012; and that was during a down year, plagued by warm temperatures and devastating wildfires. In 2011, Colorado’s rafting industry generated an economic impact of more than $151 million.

“In 2012, Colorado saw virtually no snow after March, and that situation was compounded by a warm spring and several devastating wildfires that garnered national attention,” said CROA Executive Director David Costlow. “The state’s weather patterns over the past three weeks give plenty of reason to think that more moisture will be in the forecast, thus adding to the snowpack and overall water levels. This puts outfitters on track to offer rafting throughout the typical rafting season.”