Areas of light snow and flurries will impact north-central Indiana Thursday morning, especially north of Indianapolis. This won’t amount to much and most of our Thursday will be free of snow, along with continued unseasonably cold temperatures. Speaking of the cold, Indianapolis is running 7° below average, month-to-date.
Looking ahead, a rather prolonged and significant snow event is setting up shop across northern Indiana. We forecast snow to begin falling Thursday night before becoming heavy at times Friday. A tight thermal gradient will aid in the combination of ingredients to produce hefty snowfall across far northern IN and also provide a brief break from the cold, locally, Friday afternoon (forecasting highs into the 40s here). With that said, if your travels take you north, prepare for significant travel disruptions with the heavy snow.
A cold front will drop south into central Indiana overnight Friday into Saturday. At the same time, a couple of disturbances will ride northeast along the front. This will result in periods of light wintry precipitation across central Indiana over the upcoming weekend. Initially, this should be rather insignificant with a mix of light rain and perhaps some light sleet or light freezing rain Saturday.
However, as our airmass becomes progressively colder Saturday night into Sunday things will become more interesting. At the same time, a final wave of energy will lift northeast, spreading moisture into the colder air mass. We forecast more widespread wintry precipitation to engulf central Indiana Saturday night into Sunday. A wintry mix of sleet and snow is possible early on before transitioning to all snow Sunday morning. A period of accumulating snow is expected Sunday and we’ll fine tune numbers as we move closer.
Looking further ahead, an active time of things will continue as the battle remains between cold centering itself across the northern Plains into the Lakes and Ohio Valley and resistance from the southeast ridge. This will continue to lead to a busy period of weather across the region, including storm systems that will come along every couple of days.
We continue to think things are aligning in a fashion that should result in a significant period of cold developing during the second half of February into March this year. We note the teleconnections continue to trend in cold directions and the MJO is also rolling along into the colder phases. We have a long, long ways to go this winter and think some headline events remain on the table as we close the month and open March. Time will tell.
We forecast snow to arrive in the city, itself, around 8-9p and snow at a steady clip for a few hours before ending during the overnight. By the time things wrap up, we forecast 1″ to 2″ for most of central Indiana.
Another snow maker will arrive on the scene Tuesday night into Wednesday morning. From this distance, this looks like a light snow event for the region and we’ll have updated thinking around this event later tonight or Tuesday morning.
Arctic high pressure will result in a cold, but dry (and sunny) close to the work week.
As we move into the weekend, our weather will begin to turn more active. This will be the first of a series of snow systems over the upcoming 7-10 days. While this initial event won’t be significant, it’ll get the ball rolling on (at least what we believe will be) another extended stretch of wintry conditions. We forecast a couple periods of light snow (“light” being the key word) this weekend: Saturday evening and again Sunday evening. It appears as if the energy will remain very disorganized over the weekend and the result will be light snow accumulations during the Saturday through Sunday period.
Again, this is only the beginning of a very active pattern; one that will shoot snow systems at us in an “every other day” fashion over the upcoming 7-10 days. We’ll keep close tabs on last minute adjustments that may be needed with such a pattern. Often times modeling will struggle with the fast-paced northwest flow and models will have to “correct” last minute towards a more significant event.
Additional opportunities for accumulating snow lie ahead, including: