Eighth snowiest winter at MSP so far — midweek temps in 40s ahead

Snow reports through 9:45 AM Sunday.

As we have been watching a system moving through the region, the heaviest snow has fallen across the northern half of northern Minnesota, with numerous 8-16" totals. The heaviest totals through 9:45 AM came from near Duluth and northeast of Brainerd (near Little Pine), where both locations reported 16" of snow. 14" of snow was reported north of Two Harbors.

Officially on Saturday, 2" of snow fell at MSP airport with more falling on Sunday. Record snow on Saturday of 5.9" was reported in Duluth (previous record: 5.2" in 1942), with a record 9.1" also falling in Grand Forks (previous: 4.1" in 1988).

With Saturday's 2" of snow, we're now up to 80" even for the snow season at MSP airport - the 8th snowiest on record. While the St. Cloud tally is only through Friday (their snow data comes in delayed), they are at their 7th snowiest winter. Elsewhere across the region, Duluth sat at its 12th snowiest snow season through Saturday (with additional snow through 11:15 AM Sunday they were now in 9th place with 114.1"), and Sioux Falls sits at their 11th snowiest. Ever-snowy Marquette is only at its 28th snowiest.

Here are the top ten snowiest winters on record for the Twin Cities. As mentioned, we're now sitting at the 8th snowiest (not counting any snow that fell on Sunday). We would only need 5" to move into the top 5, and we're 18.7" from the snowiest winter on record.

As of Sunday morning, the snow depth at MSP was 11", marking the 103rd consecutive day with at least an inch of snow depth - good enough for the 23rd longest (note: graphic above shows the 2022-23 season number only through Saturday). We would need an inch of snow on the ground through the morning of March 23rd to tie the tenth longest on record.

Meanwhile, Duluth sat at a snow depth of 37" Sunday morning, which was the deepest snowpack they've had since January 22, 2005. It's not the latest they've had a snow depth this deep (or deeper) this late into the season - in fact, their greatest snow depth ever of 48" was back on March 19, 1965.

_______________________________________________

While we look to start our Monday off with some sunshine (likely a sun/cloud mix), clouds do look to increase as we head into the afternoon hours. Temperatures will start off the day in the upper teens, climbing to the upper 20s for highs.

The sunniest skies throughout the day on Monday will be up across northern Minnesota, with a mix of sun/clouds to mainly cloudy skies the farther south you head. Highs will be in the upper teens in Red River Valley, with 20s elsewhere.

_______________________________________________

We see a nice warming trend in the forecast as we head toward the middle of the week, with highs expected to reach the 40s Wednesday and Thursday. Unfortunately, though, a system moves in later this week that'll usher back in some cooler Canadian air with highs back in the 20s by Friday.

That cooler air (20s and 30s) looks to last into next weekend and early into the next week before 40s make a return for the full first day of Spring Tuesday the 21st (the equinox occurs at 4:24 PM Monday the 20th).

Six-hour precipitation forecast between 7 AM Thursday and 7 AM Saturday.

Here's a look at our potential late-week system here in the upper Midwest. Right now it looks like precipitation would start off as rain in the metro on Thursday, changing over to snow Thursday Night and Friday as the system pushes out. Some wrap-around flurries may still be possible into Saturday depending on how fast this system moves out. There is still a lot of uncertainty - how temperatures turn out and the overall track of the system will make a difference between rain and snow - and models try to put out some heavy (plowable) snow wherever that band sets up. More details later in the week - but we could definitely see travel issues across portions of the state late Thursday into Friday if the current track holds.

_______________________________________________

Spring Is Nowhere In Sight
By Paul Douglas

It'll melt. Probably sometime in April. By the middle of May. No later than June. The view outside my window resembles the opening scene in the movie "Fargo". Favorite coping skill: keeping the Golf Channel on so I can see the color green. During commercials I watch the snow melt on my asphalt driveway, a reminder that the sun is as high in the sky today as it was back on September 29.

The sun peeks out today with a better chance of sunglasses on Tuesday. 80" so far this winter, almost twice the average amount of snow. This is the 8th snowiest winter on record for the Twin Cities. Five more inches and we enter Top 5 Winter Snowfall territory, and that could still happen later this week. Snow arrives Thursday, with plowable amounts possible before skies clear by Sunday.

Meanwhile, Duluth has more than 3 feet of snow on the ground - the most since 2005. Nearly 120" has piled up in some KDLH suburbs.

Can we ship some of this snow (by rail) to friends in south Florida or Arizona? Just a thought.

_______________________________________________

Paul's Extended Twin Cities Forecast

MONDAY: Mostly cloudy, chilly. Wake up 18. High 29. Chance of precipitation 20%. Wind N 10-15 mph.

TUESDAY: Sunny and breezy. Wake up 12. High 31. Chance of precipitation 10%. Wind SE 10-20 mph.

WEDNESDAY: Clouds increase, PM rain shower? Wake up 28. High 40. Chance of precipitation 50%. Wind S 15-25 mph.

THURSDAY: Period of snow, few inches expected. Wake up 32. High 34. Chance of precipitation 90%. Wind N 15-30 mph.

FRIDAY: Snow tapers to flurries, still icy. Wake up 27. High 29. Chance of precipitation 60%. Wind NW 15-30 mph.

SATURDAY: Few sunny breaks, passing flakes. Wake up 18. High 25. Chance of precipitation 40%. Wind NW 10-20 mph.

SUNDAY: Sunny with better travel. Wake up 12. High 30. Chance of precipitation 10%. Wind W 7-12 mph.

_______________________________________________

Minneapolis Weather Almanac And Sun Data
March 13th

*Length Of Day: 11 hours, 46 minutes, and 44 seconds
*Daylight GAINED Since Yesterday: 3 minutes and 9 seconds

*When do we see 12 Hours of Daylight?: March 18th (12 hours, 2 minutes, 31 seconds)
*When Is The Sunrise At/Before 7 AM? March 29th (6:59 AM)
*When Is The Sunset At/After 8 PM? April 17th (8:00 PM)

_______________________________________________

This Day in Weather History
March 13th

2006: A March snowstorm dumps 9.9 inches at the Twin Cities.

1851: Before the spring green-up, dry grassy areas are a fire risk. On this date prairie fires blazed in Minnesota.

_______________________________________________

The system that impacted the Upper Midwest this past weekend is moving east Monday, with snow across the Great Lakes into New England. Some of the snow in New England will be heavy. Storms will be possible along a cold front in Florida and southern Texas. Meanwhile, a new system moves into the western United States with another round of heavy rain and mountain snow.

Rounds of heavy rain and Sierra snow will continue out west through the first part of the work week, with rain totals of 3-7" and additional feet of snow at high elevations. This will likely lead to more flooding across the region. Heavy snow will also be possible in interior New England during the first half of the week, with up to a foot and a half of snow for some.

_______________________________________________

Underused satellite, radar data may improve thunderstorm forecasts

More from Penn State: "Tens of thousands of thunderstorms may rumble around the world each day, but accurately predicting the time and location where they will form remains a grand challenge of computer weather modeling. A new technique combining underused satellite and radar data in weather models may improve these predictions, according to a Penn State-led team of scientists. "Thunderstorms are so ubiquitous it's hard to count how many you get in Pennsylvania, or the United States or globally every day," said Keenan Eure, doctoral student in the Department of Meteorology and Atmospheric Science at Penn State. "A lot of our challenges, even today, are figuring out how to correctly predict the time and location of the initiation of thunderstorms." The scientists found that by combining data from the geostationary weather satellite GOES-16 and ground-based Doppler radar they could capture a more accurate picture of initial conditions in the boundary layer, the lowest part of the atmosphere, where storms form."

Arctic river channels changing due to climate change, scientists discover

More from the University of British Columbia: "A team of international researchers monitoring the impact of climate change on large rivers in Arctic Canada and Alaska determined that, as the region is sharply warming up, its rivers are not moving as scientists have expected. Dr. Alessandro Ielpi, an Assistant Professor with UBC Okanagan's Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science, is a landscape scientist and lead author of a paper published this week in Nature Climate Change. The research, conducted with Dr. Mathieu Lapôtre at Stanford University, along with Dr. Alvise Finotello at the University of Padua in Italy, and Université Laval's Dr. Pascale Roy-Léveillée, examines how atmospheric warming is affecting Arctic rivers flowing through permafrost terrain. Their findings, says Dr. Ielpi, were a bit surprising. "The western Arctic is one of the areas in the world experiencing the sharpest atmospheric warming due to climate change," he says. "Many northern scientists predicted the rivers would be destabilized by atmospheric warming. The understanding was that as permafrost thaws, riverbanks are weakened, and therefore northern rivers are less stable and expected to shift their channel positions at a faster pace.""

Australia's Massive Wildfires Shredded the Ozone Layer—Now Scientists Know Why

More from Scientific American: "Massive wildfires that raged across southeast Australia in 2019–20 unleashed chemicals that chewed through the ozone layer, expanding and prolonging the ozone hole. A study, published today in Nature, describes how smoke combined with chlorine-containing molecules in the stratosphere — remnants of chemicals that are now banned — to cause the destruction. The Australian fires produced the largest smoke plume on record, releasing roughly one million tonnes of smoke to heights of up to 30 kilometres. That's well into the stratosphere, the portion of the atmosphere that contains the ozone layer, which protects Earth from harmful ultraviolet rays, says study co-author Kane Stone, an atmospheric chemist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge. In the months after the wildfires, the hole in the ozone layer, which appears annually over Antarctica, was larger and lasted longer than in previous years. But Stone says that researchers didn't know why."

_______________________________________________

Follow me on:

Thanks for checking in and have a great day!

- D.J. Kayser