Good morning on a bright and seasonable start to the last day of the work week. We'll be enjoying today's weather because as you well know, things start getting dicey later tomorrow into Sunday from a weather standpoint. Then next week the focus will be on the bitterly cold temperatures, which likely means sub-zero lows for several days depending on any clouds that may keep us from tanking. Regardless though, this will be a high impact event(s) with questions still out there regarding when the heavier snows start and how much sleet or freezing rain we're contending with into Sunday morning. See the latest forecast, maps and radar for Kansas City Do not be surprised on Sunday morning if you look out the window and there isn't a lot of snow on the ground... the transition should come fast and furious, and when it does, with the winds cranking, visibility will go down in the blowing and falling snow. IF those bands set up and align into the Metro area into the afternoon Sunday... it may well look like a blizzard. Forecast Today: Increasing clouds and chilly with highs near 32° Tonight: Cloudy skies with lows in the lower 20s Saturday: Clouds lower and thicken. Some light snow/sleet showers are possible in the PM... there may be some areas of freezing drizzle as well later in the day. Watch for a light glaze to form if that happens creating some slick conditions into the evening, especially on untreated roads. Blustery with winds gusting to 25 MPH possible towards evening Sunday: The transition to snow should develop from 6 a.m. through noon. That timing is still somewhat in flux. In the afternoon moderate to heavy snow bands should be moving through. This will be the max of the storm and the snow may continue into the evening. Temperatures will be in the low 20s or so at 12 a.m., but drop through the day into the teens with wind chills sub-zero later in the afternoon and into the overnight Monday early morning. Discussion First of all, for the tens of thousands who have been clicking and reading the blog, thank you so much for spending some of your day learning about the weather coming our way. A reminder to sign up for the blog email notice so that as soon as I hit publish, you get an email letting you know that an update has been sent to you. These last few days have seen more total views of the weather blog than any individual newscast from any station in KC... and it's not even close! Just amazing. I'm always humbled about the incredible success of the blog, especially during these winter weather events. It's a testament to how many are interested in the weather and thanks again for reading my passion project. It's certainly a labor of love... it burns me out but that comes with the territory in the world of weather. This was one of the first weather blogs in the country back in the late 90s I think, and the first in Kansas City. It's been an amazing journey. Yes there will be blogs all weekend as well, although I may try and get some extra sleep tomorrow morning so hopefully they'll be out by noon or so. During these lead-ups to the storm itself, I don't get a lot of sleep actually. Call it nervous trepidation... my mind just churns through graphic ideas or ways things can go right or wrong in the forecast process. Enough of that... onwards. Has anything changed? Yes and no. The storm is coming ashore today. IF we're going to see some bigger model gyrations, they would likely start with today and tonight's runs. So far though things seem mostly on course. There is still a real issue with sleet and/or freezing rain with this. It really is amazing as I've mentioned a few times before... everything is mostly so perfect with this storm from a track standpoint, BUT there are still indicators of some sort of 32°+ air layer weaseling into region, and that leads to precipitation type issues. Can things change with the storm? Absolutely... Why? Well, this is Kansas City after all. We've been down these paths together over the almost 30 years I've been here before... something tremendously bad looking in the end isn't as terrible as what we feared. Also, the storm, coming ashore today and splitting into two main pieces, still needs to get through the mountains out west. Those mountains can do weird things to these systems before they come into the Plains... so I'm always cognizant of this potential, and more data should pick up on this potential in tonight's runs. There will still be a nasty storm though, right? Absolutely. I don't see how we do not have a HIGH impact, miserable travel scenario at some point on Sunday into Sunday evening. The storm WON'T miss us, the issue is how much of what type of precipitation do we get. Why do I keep talking about the timing of the snow transition? This is VERY important. As I've mentioned, we still have this issue it appears, to varying degrees, with a "warm" nose. How far north it gets, and how thick it is, and how warm that layer is all play a role in freezing rain potential, sleet (ice pellets), and snow potential. More of one means less of the other, more of two means less of the other... hence why we keep harping on the timing transition. Why is that warm nose an issue? This is complicated because we're sort of relying on our model data to a large extent ono this aspect. Why are we doing this? Well, think about this concept: On the ground we have 1000s of thermometers in the country with dozens of reliable readings around the Kansas City Metro area. However, once you go above the surface, we get about two reports of temperatures above us PER DAY. This is from the balloon soundings that are sent up towards Topeka, Springfield and Omaha. That's it... three of these soundings within about 300 miles of here. Three, twice per day, and depending on where the winds are taking those balloons, they typically don't sample our local region... at all. That's were models come into play. There are occasional aircraft reports as well as they go up and down taking measurements that can be tapped into, but they vary quite a bit. So, why is that important? Well, it's an issue because several of our models, not surprisingly, have different outcomes for this warm "nose" in terms of it's location and when it's eradicated. I'm looking at the NAM model this morning and it's keeping that wintry mix of sleet and freezing rain into lunch on Sunday. This is critical because the longer that lasts, especially south of I-70 in the Metro, the lower the eventual snow totals will be. This is why I'm hammering the point of waking up on Sunday and not seeing that much snow... the longer that mix lasts the less overall snow one location will get. So, are the snow forecasts locked in? Nope... a big NOPE. Again, if we're fighting the snow transition through lunch Sunday and most of the Metro may be... it's tough to see how we get more than 4-7" out of the snow on the back side, which is still an impressive storm. Those amounts would trail off FAST S/E of I-35, perhaps to 1-4" towards US 50 and under 2" south of US 50. Suppose we switch faster on Sunday? Again, this is critical... because IF you add another 2-6 hours of snowfall, with the potential of 1" per hour rates... well you can see how that then means 6-10" on the north side of the Metro and even with a few extra hours of snow on the south side of the Metro...and additional 2-4" would be on the table. Again, until I have a lot more confidence in the playout of that "warm" nose... I'm not sure I'm changing the forecast really. I had 4-8" last night for the Metro with the 8-12" up north of Kansas City...and much lower totals south due to the longer icier times south of US 50. I'm not sure I want to change it at this juncture. Are there jackpot snow totals out there? Yup, especially near that 36 Highway corridor. Even there there will be sleet Saturday into Saturday night, but that location is perhaps better positioned to get healthier snows Sunday and faster. Here is a region that may well have near blizzard conditions. For the METRO, jackpot totals are POSSIBLE but likely only IF we get a quicker transition on Sunday. IF we are getting a bunch of snow Sunday morning... many areas IN THE METRO cold EASILY see over 10" worth of snow. What about the thunder risks that others are catching onto finally? IF you've read the blog these last few days, you are well aware that this has been mentioned since Tuesday or Wednesday. I always like picking things out days ahead of when others finally catch on to something. Odds are you won't hear thunder, but IF there were some rumbles I won't be surprised. Odds favor better chances of this south of the Metro I think. This is a dynamic storm for sure. Dynamic storms do interesting things. So, tell me again: How much snow we may get? To me, the most important graphic during these events is the next graphic. NOTHING else matters as much in my opinion for most of the area. The ice forecasts are interesting and important but 99.9% of people don't measure ice... they measure snow. The problem with ice is IF there is enough of it, hello areas south of the Metro and south of US 50, with the winds Sunday, I'm worried about power outages. Here is what I forecast last night... I'll be using that as a basis today and adjust from that. Jacob and I went though this for about 1 hour, massaging various ideas into one thought. What about the wind? Yeah, this is a big issue. The winds above us on Sunday will be ripping at close to 45-50 MPH. Some of that wind will come down towards the ground with everything falling in terms of precipitation. So, you can see the concern with near blizzard conditions and IF there is ice in areas, especially south of KC, that is a big problem. Ice on power lines + strong winds is a real bad combination to try and keep the power going. What is a blizzard? Well, there is criteria to have for a storm to be considered a blizzard. 1) you need 35 MPH wind gusts or sustained winds, you need falling snow OR blowing snow, and this is the tough one...you need to have visibilities of under 1/4 mile (I've seen some waffling in the past about that under 1/4 mile criteria). When will be the worst of the storm? Likely Sunday into early Sunday evening. IF things change to snow faster... it will be a whopper of a storm from the Metro northwards. When was the last storm like this? Good question and as I wrote about the other day IF KCI can manage 10" of snow... that will be the biggest since 2013. IF you're hearing about "historic" snows... NO! Unless we get about 25" of snow, like what happened in 1912... this won't be historic. Now IF we get 12.3" worth at KCI...then that's something that hasn't happened in 62 years! Here are the biggest snows (over 2 calendar days to account to bleed over) Didn't we have a big storm last year? I can't quite figure out why the media forgets that last January we had a pretty solid 6-12" Metro snow system. KCI was around 6.5" and Pleasant Hill was around 12" over 2 days (the 8th and 9th). It came a couple of days before the nasty cold plunge. OK I need to stop typing now. Winter storm warnings are likely for most if not all the viewing area at some point today. Joe