BLOG: MORE APRIL SNOW COMING

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2016 has been weird so far. January was pretty typical but February and March were MUCH warmer than average. Now it seems that April is trying to do it's best March impression. We had some accumulating snow and strong winds last weekend and now another round of accumulating snow is looking likely for Friday night and Saturday morning.

THE SYSTEM RIGHT NOW

This thing is not much to look at at the moment, just a weak disturbance in the Upper Midwest. It will strengthen as it pushed south and east.500now.pngTemperatures will get into the 40s Friday afternoon so as the precipitation returns Friday evening, the air temperature should still be in the mid and upper 30s. So the snow will have a hard time sticking at first. There may even be some rain drops initially, mainly south of Rt 30.gfs_ptype_slp_ma_8The atmosphere will cool overnight and the snow will continue to fall. It will stick to non-paved surfaces first but eventually any untreated surfaces can start to pick up some accumulation.gfs_ptype_slp_ma_9gfs_ptype_slp_ma_10.pngAs the wind turns around to the north Saturday morning, some lake-effect/lake-enhancement will get going, adding to totals...mainly in the snow belt. Snow will taper to flurries in the afternoon. It will look and feel like January.gfs_ptype_slp_ma_11.png

IMPACTS

Travel will be impacted the most between midnight and 9am Saturday. Treated roads should be just fine for much of Saturday. Even though it will be cold and cloudy....the strong April sun can still have an impact, helping to melt snow on paved surfaces much faster than it can in January.impacts.png

SNOW TOTALS

Here's the tough part. Current computer modeling (for locations near the airport) shows roughly 1-3 inches:Model Snowfall Graph.pngWhile this is valid for areas near Vienna, it may be a decent representation of the entire WFMJ viewing area.Odds of our viewing area picking up 1" or more are pretty high. European model has those odds around 70-90%:1inch.pngThe odds of 3" or more are quite a bit lower, which lends credence to the idea that this will be a 1-3" type of event.3inch.pngHighest risk of 3" or more is probably in the primary snowbelt: Cuyahoga, Lake, Geauga, Ashtabula counties.This should NOT be one of our biggest April snow events on record. Who remembers 1987?BIGAPRILSNOW

We'll put out an "official" snow forecast this afternoon. Be sure to download the Storm Tracker 21 app to have the latest forecast at your fingertips.