snowy and cold pattern continues

we have one batch of snow overnight leaving eastern kentucky with another period of snow showers over Indiana dropping southeast. Where the snow showers fell tonight across most of eastern kentucky and in the Bowling Green area 1-2 inches of snow fell with lighter amounts where they were more scattered. This next batch overnight will likely only leave coatings for most of the region with maybe 1/2 inch in a few spots.  road condtions will cotninue to be very slick overnight with snow and refreezing, most schools already have closed for wednesday.

More snow showers are likely Wednesday with strong northerly winds up to 20 mph with lows in the mid 10’s  and highs in the upper 20’s will make for wind chills  near 0.  Both the nam and gfs are showing another .1 of qpf  from a Louisville to middelsboro line. ratios will be very high but the off and on nature of the snow may balance that somewhat so 15-20:1 is what I’m going with.  Here is the new snow forecast from the pre dawn hours (4am) into early Thursday, this does not include any snow that fell on Tuesday.

2. Thursday may not be as harsh with somewhat lighter winds and highs possibly reaching 30 across the region the sun should come out as well but with clouds and snow showers hanging out in the southeast.

3. Attention turns to a week clipper that will come through early Saturday and a storm which will bring snow to the deep south Friday into Saturday. Right now I expect clouds to increase Friday with some light snow Friday noght into Saturday morning up to an inch of snow could fall west of I-75 with the rain/snow line staying well southwest of our area. Temps may rise above freezing Friday but fall into the 20’s Friday night which may make for another slippery travel period. High pressure to the east will wash out the clipper as it comes east. Also the storm across the south has trended north bringing a light snow chance for the far south as well for areas like Somerset and middlesboro with some minor accums possible.

GFS fri night

NAM radar fri night

4. The main system that could produce decent and widespread accums is expected Sunday as low pressure tracks on Saturday from Valentine Nebraska to Kentucky by Valentine’s day. in the past 24 hours the models have come into good agreement tracking the low somewhere across the state with a band of snow to the north and west of it with decent wrap-around snows as well with very high ratios. To the rookie forecaster you would look at these two images and think there’s no problem south of the track for a decent snow.

gfs sunday

both the 850 and 540 lines are way south. However take a look at my concern, WAA which could pump temps well into the 30’s Sunday changing some areas to rain south of the track. Right now I think we can get away with an all snow approach and say the gfs is not showing  an obvious dry slot south of the low very well.  Remember this track will shift over the next few days. One thing that could make trend south a bit is the gfs is missing the amplitude of the Sat storm but the normal trend for clippers is a last minute northward shift.

GFS sun pm surface map

5.  we may get a few quiet days next tuesday and Wednesday before another system around the 19th.  The cold shows no signs of breaking up with an average of two snow decent snow chances a week through the end of the month and likely into the middle of march based on last weeks euro model’s weekly forecast.

updated forecast for snow through tommorow

First off I will just say how disappointed about the nws Louisville office right now the Bowling Green area at least should be a winter weather advisory and this after the unnecessary upgrade to a warning last night where i am. recent radar trends are showing the activity becoming more scattered in this region with a  of more impressive band of snow showers just east of 1-75. for the bowling green area 1-2 inches for tonight total with more scattered snow showers tomorrow. areas east of 1-75 will see anywhere from 1/2 to 2 inches tonight from the band just east of 1-75 now.  I’ll put the totals out through tommorow in a bit.

wrap around starting now

light to moderate snow showers moving into the 1-65 area now these will develop into the early evening and spread east producing light accumulations. Once they hit the eastern ridgetops they will become a steady snow that is moderate at times. Roads that wet will be slick and briefly snow covered under the heavier snow showers. the cold front will continue moving east as temps fall into the 20’s. I will update totals on the warp-around this evening after the UK game, go cats! I will also give my first thoughts on a Sunday snow chance.

WAA wins for a lot of you

Warm air advection moved further north than expected into eastern portions of the bluegrass and eastern kentucky which ment that the areas in 3-6 for all snow that saw the changeover fell short. this morning the rain and snow will change back to a period of snow before ending with a dusting on the end.

12:30 AM update

radar which the rain/snow line based on surface observations

I expect this to climb north overnight still, we’ll know in a hour or so if the change from snow to rain across the south and east will be delayed. periods of snow have spread over the rest of the region.

first call on wrap-around snows Tuesday night and Wednesday

- the arctic front plows through Tuesday afternoon with a temp drop from the low 30’s to mid 20’s by days end and into the mid 10’s for lows Wednesday morning winds will pick up from the nw at 10-20 mph making wind chills near 0 for most of this time frame.

- as the low heads toward the east coast snow showers will wrap around the system into the region. with temperatures well below 32 ratios could be increased say to 15:1 for now though this may need to be raised even more. the gfs has been the highest with qpf and the nam is starting to look a bit wetter to.

gfs qpf from wrap around

nam qpf from wrap- around

snowfall map for Tuesday night and wednesday

for the rest of this week a storm tracks across the south friday which still brings a slight snow chance for the far south. the gfs has a clipper sunday though I think this system will hold off a few more days.