A Wintry Veterans Day Shaping Up

Our first true taste of Old Man Winter will greet us for Veterans Day Thursday.

Today began with a few rain and snow showers over parts of Greater Nebraska early this morning, but then skies cleared and highs stayed in the seasonable upper 40’s to lower 50’s.

An area of low pressure over New Mexico is waiting for some upper-level energy rounding the corner from the Pacific Northwest now to the Desert Southwest tomorrow. This energy will help strengthen the low, and moisture from the Gulf of Mexico will stream into the Southern and Central Plains. At the same time, colder air is filtering into Greater Nebraska from the north. All this is setting the stage for a round of wintry weather beginning very late tonight and not ending until sunrise Friday.

So expect increasing clouds tonight, with the risk of light snow developing west, especially the Panhandle, with lows in the 20’s.

As the low strengthens a bit and moves slowly into Kansas during the day Thursday, light snow, or a mix of snow and rain will develop across most of the region during tomorrow morning. During the afternoon, areas over the Panhandle into the northwestern Sandhills can expect mostly snow, while most other areas can expect a mix or even a change to rain as highs reach from the mid 30’s north and west to the low 40’s south and east. Areas that remain mostly snow could see some light accumulations, especially on grassy surfaces.

However, after sunset tomorrow all areas should change over to mostly snow as temperatures drop toward and below the freezing mark, and this snow should continue through at least the first half of the night as lows continue to fall into the 20’s. It is at this time that most areas could see a bit of accumulation, but more importantly, some slick travel could develop, especially on bridges and overpasses, so tune in later tonight and especially tomorrow for updates. Accumulations by the time the snow ends around sunrise Friday may be two or three inches across the Panhandle and northern Sandhills, to maybe an inch over areas like North Platte and Broken Bow.

However, the storm has shown some signs of slowing down a bit, and if more slowing occurs more snow could fall, so again stay tuned for later updates.

Regardless, Friday afternoon into the weekend should be fair with seasonable highs in the 40’s.

Mike