December Blizzard aiming for Milwaukee | Chicago?

Dec 19, 2012
Blizzard now underway across the Midwest

A powerful blizzard is now under way and will affect a large part of the nation, including Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, and Wisconsin. Snow totals are expected to be high particularly across Wisconsin. A strong 500 mb trough will become negative which will result in a rapid, deepening low pressure near Chicago into Michigan. Strong winds and heavy snow will no doubt cause major impacts.

The big headache for forecasters will be where the rain/snow line will set up across southeast Wisconsin. This will make or break snow amounts. It should be interesting to see if thundersnow will occur during the storm on Thursday as well. Please take extra precaution and be safe my friends!

December 16, 2012

A mid December 2012 winter storm will be aiming for Chicago and Milwaukee sometime around Wednesday night and Thursday. Just a reminder, the track and intensity of this storm can and will probably change. This storm is still 96 hours out and until the storm is sampled by the upper air network, there will be changes in the track. This storm has the potential to produce strong winds which will cause blizzard like conditions, but a full out blizzard is not likely at this point.

Computer Model Run Synopsis

Saturday's model runs were consistent with pushing the low further northe across Missouri, Illinois and southeast of Milwaukee. The 12z computer model guidance today offered some changes with the track. The most notable shift in track was the ECMWF (European Model) that has the track further southeast about 125 miles from yesterday. Let's briefly break down each model:

NAM - Furthest northwest and brings warmer air into Wisconsin, eastern Iowa and Illinois. Heavy snow would fall across Iowa, southeast Minnesota and northwest Wisconsin. At this time, this model is an outlier.

GFS - Faster solution and has the track between the Nam and European models.

ECMWF - As mentioned above, the european model has shifted the track further southeast and is now on the southern edge of the model consensus.

GEM(Canadian) - Track near the european, but not as far south.



Stay Tuned!

It's too early to get into specifics and that will become more clear probably not until Tuesday or Tuesday night. Finally, Milwaukee and Chicago may finally break their longest "snowless" streak since March 2012. Stay Tuned!

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