Good Thursday to one and all and thanks for making the blog your home for weather. Old man winter has awakened from his 9 month nap and is in a cranky mood. If you are a fan of cold and snow… cranky is a good thing. We started the new month with snow showers and cold temps Wednesday and this is the beginning of one a very wintry period that will carry us through next week.

As a matter of fact… the first week to 10 days will likely mark one of the coldest openings to December in a long, long time. The cold isn’t the only thing to talk about as we will have several shots of snow during this time as well.

A weak system crossing the Ohio Valley later today into Friday morning will keep clouds across most of the area. This will also produce snow flurries and even a band of some light snows later today. Here is your radar for your flake tracking needs…



A lot of what is out there today probably won’t even show up on radar. It shouldn’t be enough to cause any accumulations, but will serve the Christmas and holiday season purpose. High temps will generally run in the 30s once again.

Friday may see some morning flakes with temps in the upper 30s and low 40s for highs.

We will quickly turn our attention to the increasing threat for a weekend snowfall for much of the region. Low pressure will develop in the plains Friday and work southeastward through Missouri then east across Tennessee and off the Carolina coastline by Saturday night. Snow will break out along and north of the track of this low with the potential for a decent snowfall for many. Here is a map of the track I expect…



The area I have outlined for snow has the best chance at seeing snow on the ground before it all wraps up Sunday morning. There will be some early day mixing issues on the southern and southwestern side of that outline… but it is too early to pinpoint exactly where that will be.

It is also too early to try to get specific with snow totals… but I will have a first call map out later today. I do think a swath of 2″-4″ of snow is very possible for a lot of people Saturday into Saturday night. There is the chance for that total to be a bit higher as there is a lot of lift showing up ahead of this system.

We have talked about the models just catching on to what we have been yapping about for several days now and they are still trying to get a firm hold on the situation. JUST FOR FUN… here is what they are showing for snowfall Saturday and Saturday night…

GFS Snowfall Forecast


NAM Snowfall Forecast

Please do NOT get caught up in the exact amounts they are showing! They are waffling quite a bit with the placement of the snow axis and are also trying to figure out the temp profiles.

Once this system moves through… a period of frozen tundra weather is likely from Sunday through, at least, Wednesday. Temps are going to go into the tank with highs only in the 20s during this time with lows down into the low and mid teens. Winds are going to be very gusty as well and single digit wind chills will be possible at times.

What about the white stuff? This is a heck of a north and northwesterly wind flow setting up for several days in a row. The VERY warm Great Lakes will be wide open for business and should lead to a nasty period of snow showers and snow squalls for the eastern half of the state. Throw in some small scale impulses diving in and you can throw snow on the ground several days in a row.

You can see this flow on the GFS…


With the cold air in place… snow ratios would be pretty high. Let me say this… IF this pattern does come to pass… look out eastern and southeastern Kentucky! That would drop several inches of snow over a 4 or 5 day period. This setup would also produce accumulating snows as far west as the I-65 corridor on days when the flow has a more northerly component.

That will be something to really watch out for and if I grow more confident of that actually happening… I won’t be shy about ramping up the talk about it. Oh wait… when am I ever shy?

There you have it… a very wintry period ahead of us. I will have an update with a first call for Saturday snowfall map coming later today.

Have a great Thursday and take care.