Good Thursday, everyone. The first winter system is rolling into the region today, bringing the snow showers and flurries today with a light snowfall coming this evening into early Friday. This kicks off a pattern that looks pretty wintry as we get ready to close out November and head into December.

Here’s a quick breakdown:

TODAY

  • A few rain and snow showers are out there this morning with snow showers taking over this afternoon.
  • With gusty winds of 30mph or greater, visibilities will be reduced at times.
  • Most of the snow showers will be melting on contact.
  • Temps are mainly in the 30s with wind chills dropping through the 20s.

THIS EVENING AND OVERNIGHT

  • Bands of light to moderate snows drop in from northwest to southeast. It will snow pretty good at times, folks.
  • The greatest concentration is central and eastern Kentucky.
  • Snowfall is likely on grassy surface and elevated surfaces, but roads will likely just be wet.
  • Lots of coatings will show up with the chance for an inch or two if everything goes just right.
  • Areas of southeastern Kentucky near the Virginia border may pick up more than 2″, especially in the high mountains.
  • Temps hover around the freezing mark with wind chills upper teens and low 20s.
  • If temps can hit 32 or below, we will have to watch the bridges and overpasses.

FRIDAY

  • Morning light snow exits southeastern Kentucky.
  • A few rain and snow showers then show up for the rest of the day.
  • Low clouds will be noted all day as gusty northwest winds continue.
  • Wind chills once again feel like the 20s.

Here’s the New Call for Snowfall…

The forecast models continue to be incredibly stable with the snowfall forecasts…

Clouds will hang tough across central and eastern Kentucky into early Saturday before the clearing slowly gets in by late day. Temps are in the 40s.

Sunday looks like a nice day with highs in the 50s with clouds thickening by the end of the day. Those clouds are ahead of a cold front bringing showers in here Monday and Monday night with colder air coming in behind this.

An east to west boundary sets up across the region and it has some really cold air to the north of this. We have an increasing signal for a winter storm system or two to possibly show up over the long Thanksgiving holiday weekend. How the potential plays itself out and what impact it has on our weather remains to be seen.

The GFS is going with two systems on the latest run. The first moves through with rain and some flakes behind this as it moves through Wednesday through Black Friday…

The same model then brings a healthy winter storm rolling across the region into the northeast a day or so later…

The EURO hasn’t really been seeing much of a system but that’s to be expected as the bias of the model is to really struggle with energy coming from the southwestern part of the country. That said, the latest EURO is seeing the big storm system possibilities during the Thanksgiving holiday period…

This is a pretty healthy signal that’s been there for several days and it gets louder as we get closer.

All of this is part of the pattern I’ve been yapping about. Arctic air is about to flex in a BIG way across the country in the closing week of November and that likely takes us through the first few weeks of December, at least.

This kind of pattern turns much of the country into an ice box over the next few weeks…

We haven’t seen a pattern like this to start December in a long, long time. You have to go all the way back to December of 2010 to find our last true cold and snowy December.

Buckle up, winter lovers.

I will have updates later today. Don’t forget to click on our Kentucky Weather Cams to watch the flakes flying across different parts of the state. Here are your tracking tools for the first blast of winter…

Have a great Thursday and take care.