Another cold and snowy winter forecast

The National Weather Service issued its winter forecast today. The "good" news is that it goes right along with what we told you to expect in an earlier post.  It is likely to be cold and snowy this winter. If you look at the map to the left you will see that NWS expects us to have a greater than 40% chance of above normal snowfall. In addition, they say we have a better than 33% chance of colder than normal temperatures. Woo hoo! Winter sports enthusiasts will love this!

Here's what we posted earlier in the month:

• Lake effect snow will begin in mid to late November and continuing into early January.
• The coldest time period should by from around Thanksgiving until just past New Years.
• The snowiest period should come during January and February.
• Expect frequent clipper storms to move through the lower Great Lakes.

A few more days, then back to cool and wet

A cold front over the western Great Lakes midweek will
make its way into eastern Ohio late in the week and bring
with it breezy conditions, cooler temperatures,  and showers.

The nice, sunny, above normal temperature weather will continue through midweek, then a change to more Fall-like weather will occur.

Upper 70s to around 80 degree daytime highs will hang around through Tuesday.  We will start a slide downward on Wednesday with highs only in the mid-70s, then a bit cooler on Thursday, and much cooler on Friday. Friday's high will be in the low to mid-60s with even cool highs for the weekend. Toss in some late week and weekend showers and it will be a return to Fall.

So, enjoy these next few days.

Let's take a look at Winter

The winter predictions are starting to come out. One of the first comes from AccuWeather's Long Range forecaster Paul Pastelok. According to Pastelok, we will see a lot of lake effect snow in the area this year. He also sees above normal snowfall for the region in part do to frequent clipper storms moving through the lakes. The heaviest snow, he predicts, will be in January and February. The coldest part of the winter will be from around Thanksgiving until just past New Years, but on average we should be near normal for the winter season.

Here are the bullet points of Pastelok's forecast:

• Lake effect snow will begin in mid to late November and continuing into early January.
• The coldest time period should by from around Thanksgiving until just past New Years.
• The snowiest period should come during January and February.
• Expect frequent clipper storms to move through the lower Great Lakes.

So there you go.  The first look is for above normal snowfall with temperatures averaging about normal.

Relief is on the way!

If it got too cold too quickly for you, relief is on the way! After we get past Monday, conditions are going to improve considerably.  In fact, it's going to be a very nice fall week. Temperatures will average around normal in the upper to mid 60s and some days even higher than that. All that with lots of sunshine! So, just hang in there through Monday and life will be good.  :-)

Cold air and a Fall-like weekend

(Map courtesy of Accuweather)

The coldest air so far this season is going to drop into the region for the weekend.  Cold front number one will cross over Thursday evening. A second cold front will push through on Friday evening and after daytime highs in the mid 60s on Thursday and in the upper 50s for Friday, we will see highs only around 50 on Saturday.  Combine that with a stiff NW wind and lake effect rain showers and it's going to be a rather cold and damp couple of days.
Friday night football is going to be what I call "dog nose" weather...cold and wet so make sure you bundle up if you are going out.

Not much going on

There's not been a whole lot of exciting weather going on the past few weeks.  Aside from a lot of rain, with more to come, it's been a rather uneventful time. No complaints here.  But, now that fall has officially arrived, I suspect we can start to look for Mother Nature to throw us some radical mood swings. I don't see anything bizarre in the next few weeks, just some roller coaster temperatures from the 70s to the 60s. Typical fall stuff. When the winter storms start forming, that's when we'll have fun!

Is that the sun I see?

Wow!  Monday morning and the sun is shining!  It's been a while since we have seen clear skies with sunshine. Finally the remnants of that upper level storm from last week have moved away.  That's going to allow us to have a couple of nice days before colder air and clouds move in midweek.

Temperatures today (Monday) and tomorrow will be around 80. That's just a tad above the normal daytime high of 75. But, don't get too excited.  Two cold fronts will cross the area this week, one late Tuesday and another on Wednesday, knocking daytime highs back into the 60s. In fact, we could see overnight lows dipping into the 40-45 degree range on Thursday and Friday mornings.  Ooooo!  The chill of Fall.