Here we ago again! A couple of weeks removed from the biggest snow storm we have seen in the last two Winters and we are already talking about a storm that has the potential to one up that.  First to get you up to speed, here’s where we stand so far for the entire Winter.  We are sitting about 9″ below in the snowfall department, but we will have a chance to make most of, if not all of it up with this next Winter Storm.

Now on to the storm.  It will likely come in two distinct waves.  The first overnight and into late Tuesday morning with second push of moderate to heavy snow falling from Monday evening into Tuesday afternoon.  In between, during Monday afternoon, lighter snow will persist with a few breaks.  We could have a couple of inches on the ground by the morning commute, especially in Austin, Albert Lea and surrounding areas.  A general 2-4″ can be expected by Monday evening with the initial burst of moderate to heavy snow.  The better chance for the significant accumulation will come with the second push.  Below is how the storm will likely play out.

Above is the first band of snow moving in overnight that could cause a slippery morning commute.  After this initial band moves through, the snow is expected to become lighter for the time being until it picks up again later in the evening.

The second burst of moderate to heavy is snow is likely where we will pick up most of our accumulation.  Monday night is when we will likely see the heaviest snow.  The snow is expected to shut off by the late afternoon on Tuesday.  This will be a long duration snow event with two distinct snow episodes.  Here is the latest.  Isolated higher amounts could be possible in the purple outline.

A change in the track could have big impacts on the forecast.  Stay with KTTC for the latest.

Posted under climate, snowfall amounts, winter, winter weather

It has been a long time since we have talked about something being above average other than the temperature.  The February of 2013 is changing that though.  Through February so far we have had 15″ of snow fall at the Rochester International Airport.  That was jump started by day after day after day of Clippers to start the month and then recently with the biggest snowstorm we have had in the last two winters.  Climatologically speaking,  February is the least snowy of the snowy months, but during the Winter of 12/13 it has been the snowiest.  Not only has it been the snowiest this Winter, we have actually cracked the top 10 snowiest for the month of February.  Here’s the list of five through ten.

In the coming days we will have a chance to climb up this list a little higher.  We are watching a large system that will feature the heaviest snow staying well to the south and east of our area, but come Tuesday and Wednesday, we will have a chance to be scraped by this system.

This is how the storm will look on Monday evening.  This system will likely bring a full blown Blizzard to parts of the plain states.  The track again will stay away from us, most likely putting Chicago in the bulls eye after slamming portions of Kansas and Missouri with over a foot of snow.  Our chances will be Tuesday and Wednesday and the intensity will be MUCH lighter.  With that said, a jog in the track northward would change things drastically so we are still monitoring the track of this one.

February has definitely brought active weather back to Minnesota.  Hopefully this stretch will continue to help replenish area streams and rivers.  The recent liquid will help somewhat to do that, but we need this active weather to continue into spring to help put a dent in the drought since the ground is still frozen.  Fingers crossed, but definitely a positive sign going forward!

Posted under climate, Drought, history, minnesota, Records, weather, winter, winter weather

Bullet Points:
-Start time: 9pm around Mason City, 11pm-Midnight around Rochester
-Will school be cancelled or delayed? If it snows as much as expected, chances are there will be many delays and cancellations, but that decision won’t be made until early Friday morning and it is made by school superintendents.
-Finish time: Snow will be wrapping up late Friday afternoon into the early evening. Travel will be just fine almost all of Thursday and will improve quickly Saturday

Here is where the storm is located at 10pm Wednesday evening, the center of the coming storm depicted by the red ‘L’.

Below are the National Weather Service headlines for Thursday evening through Friday afternoon

Below are the primary impacts from the coming snow

…and this is my snowfall forecast, between Midnight Thursday night until 6pm Friday.

Posted under severe weather, winter

Temperatures are hovering just a degree or two below zero across southern MN as I type this up tonight. By tomorrow morning, temperatures will be close to their coldest of the season if not the coldest if lows drop colder than -10 degrees.

This cold air moved in Monday afternoon and temperatures have been falling since then. With that push of colder air came a shot of snow with strong winds. Amounts weren’t much, from a trace to an inch, but for a couple hours in southeast Minnesota conditions seemed almost blizzard-like with very low visibility between 11pm Monday and daybreak Tuesday morning.

Hopefully you had a chance to see the beautiful sundogs Tuesday afternoon, both around sunrise and then within the last couple hours of daylight. Thanks to Justin for sharing the above picture with me on twitter.

Now we’re looking ahead to another storm system. This one will affect northern IA from Thursday afternoon through Friday, and southern MN from Thursday evening through Friday. The latest headlines are always updated on our main weather page, www.kttc.com/weather, so I won’t bother you with those details here. Regarding totals, the going forecast for southeast MN and much of northeast IA this Tuesday evening is about 6″. If you like ranges a bit better, here you go. I expect higher amounts of snow in a swath across portions of north-central Iowa. The heaviest amounts should be found in southwest IA to extreme southeast NE.

We’ll fine tune that snowfall forecast as we near Thursday afternoon. For now, it’s subject to change.

Posted under winter

We’ve been talking for a while now about the chance to get a “nice” snowstorm by the end of the work week.  As it stands now the area will be affected by a large storm that will contain all snow for a change.  Some other details such as accumulation range are a bit hazy because of the environment the eventual surface low will track.  I’m going to break down the things we are watching as things start to come together in the next couple of days.

First off we are going to take a look at the storm itself.  Yep, you are looking at her.  This dip, outlined by the blue arrows is the key for everything coming together.  The Water Vapor Imagery shows us how much moisture is in the mid levels of the atmosphere, and with that, we can see how the atmosphere is moving.  The dip, meaning there is a pocket of cold air a loft in the atmosphere, will move down the west coast of the United States.   (The land mass directly above the “U” shape is Alaska.)

Wednesday, a Surface low will develop in the four corners region of the United States.  The next few graphics will show how the storm will evolve by the end of the week.  Southern Minnesota and north Iowa will likely see a brief period of heavy snow initially Thursday evening that could last into early Friday morning.  Snow has the chance to continue to fall into early Saturday morning.  The snow, however will be much lighter going forward with the event, and the heaviest snow should fall as the storm starts on Thursday.  We will take a look at why this will happen after the sequence of graphics.

Notice the center of low pressure doesn’t move much from Thursday night to Friday night.  That is because, the atmosphere is in a blocking pattern so the pipeline will be clogged up.  That will in turn make a long duration snow event, but it will also tend to give us lighter precip during the event since the storm will be battling a ridge of high pressure that is blocking things up.  A change in this pattern could cause significant changes to the storm and therefore the forecast over the next couple of days.   The picture below shows the dip that is currently (as of 2/17) near Alaska, now in the four corners and heading towards a ridge of high pressure.  That ridge will act to weaken the low a little bit, but also cause it to stall close to the area, keeping us in the light snow for a long period of time.

As things become a little more clear, we will fine tune tune the details!

Posted under winter, winter weather

As advertised another winter storm is coming this way, but like the last one, it will feature ice.  We will be on the “warm” side of the system that will feature a number of different precipitation types.  Precip should start out as freezing rain for most as the precipitation moves north through Iowa, eventually crossing into southern Minnesota.

Like with the storm a couple of weeks ago, even with the changing precip types, ice will be the biggest factor.  It will likely impact travel through the first half of Sunday, if not even longer.  Salt has issues with freezing rain since the rain washes the salt off the roads before freezing on contact to all surfaces that are below freezing.  The graphic below shows ice accumulations approaching a tenth of an inch of ice, but amounts could be a little higher thanks to road surfaces staying below freezing even when the air temperature is above freezing.

By the mid to late afternoon there will be a better shot to see just plain rain, but take note that untreated road surfaces could still have patchy icy spots through the entire day.  Even though the air temperature may read above freezing Sunday, road surfaces have the potential to be below freezing for much if not all of the day.  The rain, potentially with a few rumbles of thunder will then change back over to snow as colder air enters the storm.  We could pick up an inch or so by early Monday morning.  In case you were wondering, if this was all snow, we would probably pick up around 5-10 inches give or take.  One can dream right?  Out west and north in the warning areas could pick up over a foot in spots.

Posted under winter, winter weather