Good Sunday, everyone. We continue to watch our Ohio Valley winter storm slowly get organized as it rolls into the region later today. For Kentucky, this brings a swath of winter weather, heavy rain and possible flooding, then a little more winter weather.
Here’s a breakdown of how this looks to play out:
- Much of the daylight hours are dry across the state as clouds quickly thicken.
- A sharp looking band of winter weather and snow develops and rolls eastward late this afternoon into the evening, impacting the northern half of the state.
- Later this evening, we see the moisture become more widespread with rain across the southern half of the state and the snow and winter stuff in the northern half.
- Areas of northern Kentucky will likely be dealing with a snowfall through early Monday. Right now, a swath of 1″-3″ appears possible. My map will show the area of interest in a bit.
- There’s the chance for some light accumulations as far south as the Interstate 64 corridor, but this really drops off fairly quickly from the north.
- The mixed line then presses JUST to the north of the Ohio River early Monday as low pressure works into southern and eastern Kentucky. Just a few miles farther to the south and east and it would pull that winter line south.
- Heavy rainfall is likely across areas of the rest of the state. Some folks could pick up 3″+ of rain out of this, leading to a flood and flash flood threat. Right now, that best threat may end up across the southeast.
- As the low works into West Virginia Monday night, the winter line quickly sinks back into Kentucky with light accumulating snow possible in the north. Light snows then sweep across much of central and eastern Kentucky into early Tuesday with light accumulations possible before the action ends.
Here’s my outlook for the winter stuff coming this evening into early Monday…
As we check on the models, we do find a little bit of a change going on with the NAM. The NAM breaks this up into two systems now. The first late today into Monday, with a second low being farther south and east Monday night and Tuesday, delivering a better shot of winter weather to more of the state.
Here’s the first part…
Here’s the NAM snow total from both of those…
The European Model is trending in that direction…
The GFS held on to a similar solution to what it had before…
Here’s the snow map from the GFS through the same time…
The GFS Ensembles are a little more generous…
I will have updates later today, so check back. I leave you with some early Sunday tracking tools…
Enjoy your Sunday and take care.
Streams/rivers are back to being above normal flow around here, it wouldn’t take much rain to cause problems.
Already over 4 inches of rain for the month-to-date in Harlan!
I’m dreamily if a mud Christmas just like the ones I’ve come to know in Kentucky so sad I sure something changes on January
As far as White Christmas’s go it’s okay and more healthy to keep an optimistic outlook.
As far as White Christmas goes it’s okay and more healthy to keep an optimistic outlook. My last one was in 2004 in southwest Indiana where we received 22 inches of snow. A real White Christmas. It was the best Christmas I ever had with my family. Now, all I have or wish for is a ” Merry little Christmas. “
As far as White Christmas goes it’s okay and more healthy to keep an optimistic outlook.
It’s okay to wish for a White Christmas too.
Dreaming of
Light rain, moderate rain, or heavy rain which may bring flooding to some low lying areas is better and more preferred than hours of freezing rain. Looking forward to a more quiet weather with slightly below normal temperatures until next weekend when it starts to warm up once again with another rain system ? Christmas Eve on the extended looks mild and could be wet or dry ?
Whether it is wet or dry, We know it won’t be white.
The lack of the word Snow in the title says it all for 95% of KY. Rain event for us.
Hey Chris, Your site seems to be hacked with a trojan virus. My virus protection is catching it but it for now but thought you would like to know. It shows itself as needing to download google protect covering your screen.
Please fix!!!
Same problem here — it seems somehow linked to Google Protect. It’s gone this morning (for the first time in days) so maybe . . .
With that said Mary Salyer. I am going to ditch this site as this computer is not mine and I don’t want to get a virus in my brothers computer. Being on this site was fun and I wish everyone a quiet Sunday, a very Merry Christmas and best Wishes in the coming New Year. Deleting this site now. Good luck Chris and I hope to God that no one on here has my brothers e-mail address.
Ok Schroeder good luck and will see ya tomorrow or in a few days.
Cue the Spongebob time cards. 😉
In other words, we will see you back on this site in about a couple days.
Didn’t your “brother” ban you from this site?
I notice on the water vapor loop that the Arctic air is staying farther north than it did in November when we had that brief bout with winter weather. I also notice that along the Gulf states there is a good chance of severe thunderstorms for tomorrow, maybe that will cut down on our rainfall totals for tomorrow ? Overall, the weather pattern is looking like early March than December. Of course this is the Ohio Valley where weather never satisfies everyone.
Long distance models thru March do not favor snow in Kentucky.
I knew the axis of the heavy rain would shift! 3 inches plus possible in SE KY on the average of the model runs.
At least it’s getting back to normal around here. Rain, rain, and more rain.
I remember people telling me that one thing they like about living around here are “the seasons”. So let’s see, we no longer get a true Winter around here, it’s a mud season. It usually gets cold around here in the Spring then jumps right to Summer with more Rain. Then fall rolls around with 85-95 until October, when it cools down and starts raining again. Not to mention the fall colors are very little due to the oppressive heat. So where are “the seasons”? Good luck to all the ski resorts trying to survive.
You are right. We just go from cold rain season to warm rain season. People were on here worrying about the lack of rain in late summer and early fall and I was loving it. I knew it was coming back and coming back to the point were you get sick of seeing it. My yard is a swamp once again…
Good job summing it up. I have said for years the climate normals are shifting north. I live near Huntington WV and my climate now resembles what one would expect in Charlotte or Knoxville. Where snow is only an occasional event and most times only a nuisance.
Winter weather advisory for my area here in Southern Ohio. Chris has us in the 1-3 inch range.