All of a sudden a simple weekend has gotten a bit more complicated.

Don't forget to set your clocks FORWARD one hour tonight as Daylight Saving Time starts officially @ 2AM Sunday morning.

Our weather yesterday sprung towards Spring...today very seasonable for mid-March and tomorrow we may return to some late FEB type weather as clouds will quickly be on the increase and gradually lower and thicken as the day progresses. I think MOST of the daytime is dry but some light showers may develop later tomorrow PM and then expand to a general light rain tomorrow night. This is where it may get complicated, because while temperatures at the surface and up through 5000 feet will initially be way too warm for any snowflakes to make it down to the ground, there is going to be a dry layer of air below the cloud deck and as whatever falls through that column of dry air, it'll evaporate and that process will tend to chill that column of air, enough that perhaps some sort of wintry mix or sleet/flakes can be created. The 18Z NAM and GFS were both reasonably bullish with the amount of precip...take a look at the 18Z runs for total liquid precip...


1st the NAM model valid through 1PM Monday...

Now the GFS model valid through 1PM Monday

So the precip is there...what about the critical temperatures of the column of air aloft...1st let me show you the FORECASTED sounding from 3PM tomorrow off the NAM...

The area that is highlighted, below 840 mbs...or 5000 feet or so is, in some cases as warm as 42 degrees aloft. Notice the left side side (dewpoints) showing dry air. The more spread between the 2 lines the drier the air is. Now notice what happens towards midnight..

The atmosphere is saturated and the column has cooled through evaporation. So it's possible that whatever falls at first is rain then we could see some sort of mixture of rain/sleet then perhaps some flakes will mix in, although even farther up the creation of snowflakes in the clouds may be tough to come by based on this information although the process is going to be easier to create flakes later into the evening.

The wave itself is not that impressive, but perhaps stronger than the models think...is located out towards the Rockies...


Well the 0Z NAM is out...and knocks us with a snowstorm tomorrow night into MON AM (3-6")...I'm not going to jump head first into this yet...but the trends today are certainly snowier...

Joe