United States Waterfall

Chasm Falls

A 9 m drop.

When to go

Carol M. Highsmith · Public domain

In numbers.

Height

0.08m³/s

Average flow

estimate

May–Jul

Best months

7kW

Water power

estimate

The water at Chasm Falls, month by month

It roars from April to May.

The fullest months: from April to May, with the snowmelt. The thinnest: from October to November. Below −4 °C on average (from December to February): the falls can partly freeze.

0.1 m³/sJan
0.1 m³/sFeb
0.1 m³/sMar
0.2 m³/sApr
0.2 m³/sMay
0.2 m³/sJun
0.1 m³/sJul
0.1 m³/sAug
0.1 m³/sSep
0.0 m³/sOct
0.0 m³/sNov
0.1 m³/sDec

high water best months to go may freeze

From about 0.03 m³/s in the lowest month to 0.24 m³/s in the highest. Best months to go, with plenty of water and pleasant days: from May to July.

Estimate: the timing comes from rain, snowmelt and evaporation (NASA POWER, 1991–2020); the amounts from the river model of HydroATLAS (WaterGAP, 1971–2000). Dams upstream can change the real flow.

Waterfall

Chasm Falls is a waterfall in United States. The water falls 9 m. It lies within Rocky Mountain National Park.

Getting there.

Estes Parknearest town · 14 km in a straight line
Parking 60 m awaynearest car park in OpenStreetMap, straight line
Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport (BJC)nearest airport with scheduled flights · 74 km in a straight lineCar hire at BJC airport (Denver)Discover Cars · Affiliate link
From May to Julybest months to go (estimate)

Plan your visit

Stay, explore and get there

Car hire at FNL airport (Loveland)Discover CarsSee

Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.

How big is it?

How big it really is.

Height of the drop from Wikidata. Buildings and the person are drawn at the same scale.

7 kW

About 0.08 m³/s falling 9 m: the power of the water as it drops.

enough to power about 2 homes, if it were all turned into electricity

Power of falling water = density × gravity × flow × height. Average flow and height as shown above; an estimate.

Seen from the sky.

8 × 8 km of cloud-free satellite image, with what OpenStreetMap knows around the falls.

Chasm Falls seen from above (Sentinel-2)

N 2 km

Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 8 × 8 km, north up. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.

The Fall River through the falls

The line follows the river as mapped in OpenStreetMap; heights from the 30 m Copernicus model, which smooths narrow drops — the published height of the falls is the one above.

The valley below the falls

Around the falls the river drops 247 m in 2.8 km. Here the river runs about 245 m below the lower rim of its valley.

What is around.

1viewpoints
—waymarked walking routes
3car parks
—swimming spots
1picnic sites
2toilets
—information boards and visitor centres
—bus stops within 1 km
2other named waterfalls within 4 kmHorseshoe Falls, Thousand Falls
—caves
9campsitesGolden Banner campsite (west), Cutbank campsite, Golden Banner campsite (east) (approx) and 6 more
—hotels, B&Bs and huts within 6 km
—restaurants and cafés within 3 km

Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit, up to 2 km around the falls (unless noted). A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet. © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).

Towns nearby

Estes Park14 km in a straight line

Weather

The weather, month by month.

	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
Afternoon °C	-3	-3	2	7	13	21	25	23	18	10	3	-4
Night °C	-13	-13	-9	-6	-1	4	8	7	2	-4	-8	-13
Rain & snow (mm)	34	39	47	64	68	44	54	44	42	43	35	37
Wet days	11	12	12	14	14	11	13	13	9	9	10	10
Sun h/day	6.6	7.7	8.3	8.2	8.4	10.6	9.8	8.7	8.8	7.3	6.4	5.9
Snow on the ground (cm)	20	22	18	13	7	1	0	0	1	9	14	18

Long-term averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, with temperatures carried to the height of the falls (2,760 m) at −6.5 °C per 1,000 m. Not a forecast.

Photos

Through visitors' eyes.

Chasm Falls (FRR) — Chris Light · CC BY-SA 4.0

RMNP 2010-07-18 (4938852353) — KimonBerlin · CC BY-SA 2.0

CHASM FALLS, ROCKY MOUNTAIN NAT'L PARK, COLORADO — JERRYE AND ROY KLOTZ MD · CC BY-SA 3.0

Recent years

Wet years and dry years

Rain of each month as a share of the 1991–2020 average. A wet season above 100 % usually means a fuller waterfall.

	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
2020	94%	163%	101%	87%	65%	86%	43%	43%	70%	63%	86%	81%
2021	65%	161%	149%	87%	110%	73%	90%	78%	68%	69%	68%	199%
2022	147%	59%	78%	57%	113%	55%	132%	111%	73%	45%	115%	169%
2023	144%	68%	103%	69%	95%	219%	96%	152%	61%	69%	59%	89%
2024	131%	120%	166%	100%	50%	63%	62%	123%	50%	41%	178%	72%
2025	136%	106%	119%	55%	106%	70%	56%	82%	147%	63%	48%	118%

130% wetter than usual 70% drier than usual

About these numbers

Names, height, width, river	Wikidata (Q37509) · CC0
River flow and catchment	HydroATLAS / RiverATLAS v1.0 (Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0
Climate	NASA POWER, 1991–2020
Relief, river profile, 3D model	Copernicus DEM GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA
Paths, viewpoints, parking	© OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL
Images	EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons

Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.