Another winter storm is on deck, with 2023 welcoming us with another dose of snow – and some ice to boot.
WCCO Chief Meteorologist Paul Douglas says this is a tricky forecast to nail down, but there are some new details coming into focus for Monday night, Tuesday and even into Wednesday.
“This is going to be, I think, a fairly big deal,” Douglas says. “One of the bigger storms of the winter. Every model run is a little bit different, but there's a fair amount of consistency from model to model and from run to run. There are four runs a day and our confidence goes up when all the models agree, and when there aren’t too many gyrations from one model run to the next. But it looks like the snow comes in around the dinner hour (Monday). I think getting home this afternoon will be just fine.”
There won’t be much snow for the most part Monday night but Douglas says watch out for mixed precipitation especially south of the metro.
“Light snow tonight, a coating to an inch,” Douglas said. “Not a huge deal and it will mix with a little bit of ice, especially south metro on southward to Mankato and Rochester. By the way, there are ice storm warnings in effect in south central Minnesota. The European model prints out half an inch of ice for Mankato. Glaze ice. I'm not sure it's going to be that much rain freezing on contact, but it could be a mess. The I-90 corridor as you head down towards Albert Lea, Austin and even Rochester and Mankato could see a significant amount of this falling as ice.”
Douglas also said this is an unusual amount of water for January in Minnesota.
“January, because it's usually so cold, tends to be one of our drier months in terms of absolute precipitation,” says Douglas. “This thing brings an inch to an inch and a half of liquid and flings it at Minnesota over the span of about 48 hours. It's going to snow more or less from this evening, right through Wednesday evening.”
Douglas says the heaviest snowfall will come Tuesday afternoon and Tuesday night.
“It now looks like the storm is going to loiter,” says Douglas. “It's going to linger longer and that snow will spill into most of Wednesday. When it's all said and done by Wednesday evening I still think it's going to be in that 6 to 10 range for most of the Twin Cities. Over a foot as you head west of the Twin Cities. Some of the models printing out 18-20 inches in southwestern Minnesota. It's going to be a pretty good pile.”
You can also expect a heavier, wetter snow for this round with slightly warmer temperatures.
“Not like what we had before Christmas when it was in the teens and it was a dry, fluffy, powdery snow blowing around,” Douglas explains. “The water consistency is going to be a lot higher with this storm and it's going to be in the mid to upper twenties.”
That also means that even some higher winds aren’t going to move much snow, which Douglas says will avoid those blizzard conditions we had before Christmas.
“The winds Tuesday will be gusting up around 25, a little bit of minor drifting perhaps by Wednesday,” says Douglas. “But I don't expect a blizzard out of this storm. So if there's any good news, I think that's the good news. But travel much of tomorrow and I'd say much of Wednesday is going to be gummed up. Leave extra time. It's going to be sloppy out there. There's no question. The saving grace is that when it's 25 to 30, in that range MnDOT the chemicals do a much better job keeping the roads wet and slushy. So the freeways maybe in okay shape.”
Douglas also says that the promised El Nino winter has now kicked in.
“I'm amazed how stormy California has been week after week, after week,” says Douglas. “Major storms pounding California. And people have been talking about an El Nino warm phase kicking in later this year. It seems like it's kicking in now. I think we're sliding into El Nino faster than anybody predicted.”
That wet weather in California, driven by El Nino in the Pacific Ocean, ends up having a big effect on the weather in Minnesota Douglas says.
That means no super cold snaps.
“I'll tell you what, looking out the next two weeks, I don't see any polar punches,” Douglas predicts. “Next week it's going to be in the twenties and thirties above zero. So even this storm, usually big storms in January are followed by a giant swing of arctic air, but I don't see it looking out into mid-January. Temperatures at or above average. I consider that a win.”
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