Another Warm Week, Storm Ahead?

A full week of temperatures above freezing, both day and night, has ended winter sports, at least until calendar spring, and made people think more about gardening and boating. Temperatures will remain well above normal through the 19th, and this would conceivably put us in the running for the warmest March on record-- due more to the persistence of the warmth-- we have not broken any record highs. Highs this coming week will be mostly in the 50s with lows in the upper 20s to mid 30s. Right now, I'm doubtful we'll set a new warm March record because the weather pattern will change by the 19th as a storm system noves in from the southwest. Initially, this storm (if it reaches us) will bring rain, but it may end as snow.

It's uncertain how cold it might become after the next weekend (20-21), but it looks like our El Nino pattern will go away for a little while.

A Rainy Week Ahead, Winter Retrospective

I guess I should know better than to discount chances of precipitation. The storm system that looked to hit mostly the Dakotas this week will be close enough to provide rain for us, too, between Monday evening and Wednesday. Due to the very slow upper winds in the northern U.S. (a pretty typical El Nino pattern), the system will be moving slowly and will hang around for a while. The combination of warm temperatures (reaching near 50 during the day, probably not dropping below freezing at night) and rain will melt a majority of our snow this week.

The graph above shows that, on average, since 1980, snow during El Nino winters melts about two weeks early, and this year looks to be no exception-- it should follow the red line in the graph pretty closely. Considering that we've had a relatively strong El Nino, our snow depth and temperature have been really good this season. The average would be 10 inches, but we've had about 14 inches on the ground during a good part of the winter, and much of the rest of the state, particularly the North Shore highlands, and southern and western Minnesota, have had even more. I've recorded 28.2 inches snow this season, which is well below average, but the water content of the snow was relatively high, so in terms of frozen water equivalent on the ground, this winter is not far from average. That, and the absence of any major mid-winter thaws made this winter feel pretty much like an average one for this area. Our average winter temperature (Dec-Jan-Feb) was 12.2 degrees F, which is only slightly above average and a couple degrees below the expected value for an El Nino winter.

More Mild Weather

Temperatures will remain mild and the weather mostly dry for the next couple weeks. The basic pattern has not changed in a month. A split in the upper air flow over North America will keep storms away from north central and northeast Minnesota. There's a small chance one of the storms will move close enough to give us light rain about Wednesday, but for the most part, precipitation will be limited to those parts of the Upper Midwest that have the greatest risk of flooding-- the Red River Valley into southwestern and southern Minnesota.

Sometimes the best forecast is a hindcast.

-Bob

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.