Good afternoon, gang. A wall of rain is rolling across the state, bringing heavy downpours with it. This rain is ahead of the first or two fronts to impact our weather through Monday. The second front brings the chance for snow showers, leading us back into a winter pattern that may fire up a bigger system later next week.

Before we get into all that, let’s track today’s rain…

The rain tapers off on Sunday, with a decent afternoon taking shape for many. The next front then works in here Sunday night and early Monday, with a cold northwesterly wind settling in behind it. That should touch off a period of light snow and snow showers that takes us into early Tuesday.

The GFS suggests a lot of coatings, with locally higher accumulations possible across the east and southeast…

Some cancellations and delays are possible Tuesday, especially in the east.

I have no changes to the thoughts on the late week system. The pattern appears to be setup for a potential significant winter weather event across parts of the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys.  As with any system, the devil is in the details, especially from several days out. You could get only get a little snow, or you could get quite a bit more. It’s just too early in the game.

Here are the determining factors on how much winter weather we get:

  • Much depends on where the front is as the wave of low pressure develops along it.
  • Areas along and north and west of the track of the low would have the best chance for accumulating snows.
  • How strong does this wave of low pressure get?

We still have a few days before those details are ironed out, so let’s just sit back and track how it all unfolds. As I always say, never get caught up in any one model run, especially in this time frame. Models in that 3-6 day window seem to lose their way a little, only to find it again within the 3 day window.

That said, let’s check on the current model runs.

The European Model shows a healthy hit for our region…

The GFS has a similar idea to what it’s been showing for many days now…

The Canadian Model has a slower frontal passage, leading to a slightly farther north low. It is currently an outlier amongst all the models…

The 21 member GFS Ensembles average snowfall continues to target the Ohio Valley…

Even after this system, the pattern argues for a few more threats behind it. If we take the above map from the GFS Ensembles and add another week to it, we can clearly see the storm track taking shape…

I will try to update things again this evening. Make it a good one and take care.