Still Quiet on the Weather Front

I can't say it's perfectly quiet. We did have 0.8" or 0.9" snow this week. However, there are no major storms in the Upper Midwest, and it will stay that way for at least the next week. Highs will be in the 30s and lows in the single digits above and below zero.

More dry weather

Our driest month of the year will go down as even drier than average. We are the center of a massive, continental-scale high pressure system that will be very effective at keeping all storms (aside from maybe a light dusting of snow on Tuesday) away from northern Minnesota for the foreseeable future. In weather forecasting, the definition of foreseeable future is never beyond a couple weeks, but the pattern is so well-established and stable, I would not be surprised to see this last through March or maybe into April.

With high pressure in control and strengthening late February sunshine, we will have a large daily range of temperature, featuring comfortable highs around freezing and lows dropping into the single digits above and below zero.

Quiet Weather

Aside from an occasional disturbance passing to our southwest along this year's dominant storm track from the eastern Dakotas through southwestern Minnesota, the weather will be mostly quiet over the next couple weeks. Temperatures will generally fluctuate around or slightly below seasonal averages for this time of year with highs in the 20s and lows in the single digits above and below zero.

Snow depths this year have benefited greatly from the lack of major warm spells and the high moisture content of the snow that has fallen (which results in less settling of the snow). Snowfall has been below average from Grand Rapids through Virginia and Ely, near average in International Falls and Duluth, and much above average over western and southern Minnesota. Despite below average snowfall in much of the KAXE area, snow depths are pretty close to average.

Chance of Accumulating Snow Sun-Tue (Feb. 7-9)

Much of the snowfall so far this winter has been far to our south and west. In fact, since Dec. 1 some towns in the Oklahoma and Texas Panhandles have had about the same amount of snow (20-21 inches) as Grand Rapids. Sioux City, Iowa has had twice as much as we've had this season, and by Sunday, the Baltimore, Maryland and Washington D.C. areas will have doubled our season total snowfall. In all those areas, the snow melts a lot more than it does here, so they don't have nearly as much on the ground-- unless they're at the tail end of a snowstorm.

The most recent snow depth map tells the story of this winter:
http://climate.umn.edu/doc/snowmap/snowmap_100204.htm

Snow depth is above average in southern and far western Minnesota but below average in Itasca County (although not by a whole lot-- we've had far worse). Likewise this week, several waves of snow have been missing us just to the southwest... from Fargo to the Twin Cities. The same trend will continue into the early part of the weekend.

By Sunday, a more vigorous upper level disturbance will drop south from Canada, and it could spread snow into northcentral and northeastern Minnesota. That is, if it, too, doesn't miss us to the southwest. Certainly, the snow will be heavier in that direction, with an additional 6-12" falling in the same areas that have received much of the snow earlier this week. If we're lucky, Grand Rapids may see several inches of snow, but I think it's more likely we'll see 1-2". Bemidji and Brainerd have a better chance of seeing heavier amounts. The disturbance will move away on Tuesday, and colder air will move back in.