WINTER STORM WARNING

6:30pm Tuesday update:  I've put a couple of changes in red below; the very recent trends introduces more dry air working in ahead of the snow, which should tail back our amounts.  This storm has two separate lows, and it's the one farther west (near us) that may put the dry slot over the mountains for a while.  Should that come to pass, accumulations will lessen and be delayed some. I'd imagine nobody would mind that...  :-)

There is a chance for a few inches of snow here in ACA...and it's typical for March, which can swing wildly in short order.  With the warmer temps, systems come in with more water content, and the incoming cold is perfectly timed with the moisture this go 'round.

We're under a Winter Storm Warning from 8pm tonight through 8am Thursday, a good 36 hours of potential snowfall. A digital forecast I like has onset after midnight, but the "likely" category has pulled back to "chance". My favored GFS which has sniffed out 'skunks' lately is showing the snow, but at amounts on the low side of the warning for us.  This will be one of those snows that going just one mile may mean the difference in who gets 2" or 4" of snow.  The going amounts in our area are 3-5", though my favored model holds ACA at just 2"-3".

Unlike last Wednesday's system, highs Wednesday will stay very cold, not much above freezing for a lot of us.  Where roads greatly improved last Wednesday afternoon (including Apple Creek Road), I'm not anticipating that this time.  And with lows well down in the 20s for Thursday morning, expect some travel issues on our mountain for a couple of days.

The good news is that it does start warming up Thursday afternoon and through the weekend...but I'm planning on hunkering down a bit here at the end of Staymon Road later this evening.

As an aside, I have a cohort from my days at KEVN FOX 7 in Rapid City, SD who just started the Appalachian Trail at Springer Mountain, GA two days ago. Welcome to the southern Blue Ridge in March, Jamie.  :-)


Bob