Three to six inches? You are reading that correctly. We are about to get more snow, mostly coming Friday night. Read it and weep says WCCO Chief Meteorologist Paul Douglas, who says that prediction might be light.
“That could be conservative. It could be more than eight,” says Douglas. “South and east of Saint Paul, south of the Minnesota River, southeastern suburbs, the Woodburys of the world, Rosemont, towards Hastings, the models print out a giant bullseye of a foot or more just south and east of the Twin Cities."
Douglas adds that most of the computer models are in agreement now that we’re getting a decent snowfall, which he says increases confidence. He says the tricky part is that this time of year, the sun can do some serious melting despite low enough temperatures for snow. But with most snow coming at night for this particular storm, it won’t matter.
“The sun angle is so high, some of the sun's infrared radiation can penetrate the clouds even when it's raining or snowing and keep roads wet,” explains Douglas. “But I think Friday night will be just below freezing. We lose the impact of that sun and the result will be some accumulating snow.
To make matters worse, Douglas says some models are predicting. Up to 10 inches for Minneapolis and Saint Paul.
“That could happen. It could happen. I'm not buying it yet,” Douglas says. “I want to see a few more runs and see if the models are consistent. But I think three to six is probably a safer range. And the far northern and western suburbs won't see much, maybe two or three. So a big gradient, a big contrast just across the immediate metro. But in general, the farther south and east you go, the better the chance of heavy snow."
The Twin Cities office of the National Weather Service is saying there's a high potential for at least four inches, with maybe up to eight in the Twin Cities. They've also issues a Winter Storm Watch for all of the metro and southern Minnesota, with a Winter Weather Advisory in place in other parts of central Minnesota and western Wisconsin.
"Snowfall amounts may range as high as 5 to 8 inches in far western MN and in western WI, with snowfall totals of 4 to 7 inches in central and eastern MN. In addition, strong winds will develop Friday afternoon which will persist through Friday night, potentially producing blizzard conditions over much of western MN and possibly into eastern MN."
The precipitation actually begins Thursday, and may start as a little wet snow-rain mix midday and early afternoon. Douglas says watch out for some freezing on roadways.
“It's certainly cold enough out there right now for some icing problems,” Douglas told Vineeta Sawkar on the WCCO Morning News. “I think it'll be rain and mainly wet roads from this afternoon right through tomorrow and then late afternoon. Right around the dinner hour Friday that changes over back to snow and I think we'll wake up to a little winter wonderland Saturday morning.”
There’s good news too.
“I still think we'll be in the upper forties to near 50 on Sunday,” Douglas predicted. “Could be the first 50 of the season. And yeah, it's coming late. Almost a month late and then the models and the European specifically has us consistently above 50 the second week of April. So a week from Saturday, I think we may start to be consistently above 50 for daytime highs. So we will be melting more snow as we sail into the second week of April.”
In between that? There’s another chance for rain, snow and some high winds on Tuesday and Wednesday of next week leading into what might be a chilly Twins home opener on Thursday with temperatures in the high thirties according to Douglas.
It’s been a long winter to be sure and Mother Nature doesn’t seem to be done with us yet.
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