The heavy rainfall and scattered thunderstorms have moved on, for now that is. The next 24 hours will be focused around much cooler temperatures with overnight lows once again in the 30s, and tomorrow’s highs only in the low to mid 40s. Tonight a few scattered showers could flair up and there is a small shot that a few snow flakes might be seen late tonight into tomorrow morning. On the back side of this potential mixy precip, the wind will ramp up by tomorrow afternoon. Sustained wind speeds of 15-25 mph are likely with gusts above 30 mph. Hang on to your hats! -Greg

Posted under rain, snow, Wind, winter weather

Now that March is finally behind us, let’s take a peek at a few April statistics.

The average high temperature for April 1st is 55 degrees with a low of 33 degrees. It sure feels like April was playing a nasty joke on us for April Fools Day today, we were a little over 15 degrees cooler than normal today. Good news is temperatures are trending upward for the rest of the work week and into the weekend. The average high for the last day of the month is 67 degrees with a low of 43 degrees, so there is something to look forward to!

The GFS model forecasts out 16 days and is currently showing the middle of April to have near normal temperatures. Average mid-April temperatures are right around 60 degrees. Now, this forecast is still quite a ways out BUT there is a light at the end of the tunnel! A record high temperature of 93 degrees was set back in 1930 and a record low of 5 degrees set in 1982, however the climate outlook isn’t putting any extremes in our forecast this month. The Climate Prediction Center is showing an average temperature and precipitation trend for the month of April. The GFS 16 day outlook is giving Rockford a potentially wetter than average first half of the month. On the bright side, more April showers brings more May flowers, right? The average precipitation for April is 3.35 inches of rain and 0.9 inches of snow.

A few facts and a small glance at the GFS long range forecast for April. Let’s hope this month is closer to average than the last!

Posted under 13 Climate Authority, climate/climate change, rain, record weather, snow, statistics, weather

Here’s a glance at Rockford’s March 2013 one last time.

If you can believe it, the normal high temperature for Rockford in March is 46.9 degrees. Sadly, March of 2013 brought us an average high almost 10 degrees cooler at 37 degrees. Our average low temperature followed the same trend, being 5.4 degrees cooler than normal. We actually only had 4 days with average temperatures above 40 degrees! What’s even more interesting is that Rockford averages 4 or 5 days of 60+ degrees in March, but this year we had ZERO! As a matter of fact, almost one third of our high temperatures and 94% of our low temperatures were below freezing! Here are two facts we can put some blame on for those cool temperatures: 1) 15 out of 31 days had an average wind flow out of the northwest. 2) 16 out of 31 days averaged cloudy skies.

Now, let’s talk about snow. Finally, a category we were above average in! On March 5th, 2013, Rockford received 9.6 inches of snowfall, crushing the previous record of 5.4 inches back in 1959. Actually, the average snowfall for March in Rockford is 4.8 inches- we almost tripled that! This March, we received 13.9 inches of snowfall. Not to mention, Rockford recorded precipitation for 21 out of 31 days!

Now we can finally say goodbye to cold, snowy March as we spring into April.

Posted under 13 Climate Authority, climate/climate change, record weather, snow, statistics, weather, winter weather

The bulk of the daylight hours of Saturday will remain dry. By late in the day, especially around dinnertime, scattered rain showers will enter the picture.  For much of the day, however, clouds will be on the increase and the breeze will pick up out of the south.  In the WREX area, highs will range from the middle 50s north to the upper 50s south. We’ll split the difference in Rockford, with a high near 57 degrees—second warmest temperature of 2013!

A frontal boundary will trek east out of the Great Plains and bring with it some light showers and even a few rumbles of thunder as close as central and southern Illinois.  We can expect up to a couple of tenths of an inch (0.10″-0.20″) in our rain gauges after the rain showers end.  The general time frame looks to be from around dinnertime/sunset until about 2:00am Sunday.

A few lingering sprinkles are possible generally before sunrise on Sunday. Otherwise, our Easter holiday will be partly cloudy with a brisk west wind. Temperatures will make a run for 50 degrees before an arctic cold front dives south late in the day.  With the passage of that front, another quick shower or two is possible Sunday night. As temperatures fall into the middle 20s overnight, a wet snowflake or two cannot be ruled out.

-Joe

Posted under FutureTrack, rain, snow, weather

There is more snow on the ground today, than any March 26th back through 2003! (Unfortunately, our resources only allow us to go back ten years when it comes to snow cover.) Right now, 46.6% of the contiguous 48 states is covered by snow. Last year at this time only 7.4% of the country had snow on the ground. The ten year average is just 23.8%.

Snow cover is important to look at when you’re forecasting weather patterns. Snow reflects much of the sun’s incoming rays, keeping the air closest to the ground cool. Until the snow on the ground really melts in the center part of the country, our chance of seeing a real significant warm up (60s and 70s) will be slim to none.

Posted under climate/climate change, snow

Snow will taper to flurries overnight with general accumulations around 1 inch. 2-3 inches are possible south of I-88 with some spots of Central Illinois receiving nearly a foot!

Black ice will be a big problem as we go through the night. Even though the snow will taper off and not be a big deal, accumulation-wise, temperatures will fall into the middle 20s. Because the snow wasn’t enough to cause many of the plows and salt trucks onto the roads, black ice will be a big concern heading into the Monday morning commute. Conditions will improve as temperatures rise above freezing around 9am Monday morning.

Please use caution and remember if the road looks wet tonight, it could very well be ice! -Eric

Posted under safety, snow

Get out those shovels, or maybe not.  Another round of snow will impact the Stateline on Sunday. However, our area will be on the northern fringe of this system.  What does that mean? For starters, our snowfall totals will be light!  Thanks to the track of this system—through the southern Plains and Ohio Valley—the significant snow accumulations will occur in Missouri, central Illinois, and central Indiana.  In fact, moderate to heavy snow will fall in a 1,500-mile swath from Denver all the way to Pittsburgh through Monday night!

In Rockford, we’ll have a dry, northeast wind which will help keep the atmosphere from saturating quickly on Sunday morning.  Also, thunderstorms are forecast for the Mid-South into the Southeast, drawing a lot of the energy and moisture far away from our area.

Snowflakes will begin to fly as early as the pre-dawn hours of Sunday, especially southwest of Rockford in the Sauk Valley.  Mid-to-late morning through early evening is our time frame for accumulating snow.  Generally, we will pick up 1 to 2 inches across the area.  Totals will be on the lighter side near and north of the Illinois-Wisconsin border (including metro Rockford).  Janesville and Monroe will be hard-pressed to even see 1 inch!  The further south you travel, including the Interstate 88 corridor, the better chance you have for picking up closer to 2 inches.  South of Interstate 88, there will be a few isolated pockets of 2+ inches.  If your travels take you even further south into Peoria, Bloomington-Normal, Champaign-Urbana, Springfield, St. Louis, or Indianapolis, accumulations of 6 to 12 inches can be expected.

While snowfall totals will be on the light side, a gusty northeast wind will create some blowing and drifting on rural roads and in open areas.  Gusts of 30 to 35mph are likely.  Lingering light snow showers or flurries are possible Sunday night through Monday.  Additional accumulation will be very light, if any.

-Joe

Posted under FutureTrack, snow, travel, weather, Wind, winter weather

Even though spring has officially sprung, another winter storm is set to affect the Land of Lincoln this weekend. Here in the northern part of the state, snowfall will be limited to the 1-3 inch range. However, cities like Peoria, Bloomington, Champaign, and Decatur could receive 3-6 inches of snow with locally higher amounts. Most models here give us about 2 inches.

Interstates will be impacted greatly on Sunday, especially south of the Forest City. If you have travel plans south of Rockford, the roads will be very treacherous.I-39 toward Bloomington will become snowcovered on Sunday. -Eric

Posted under snow, winter storm

Meteorologist Greg Bobos compared the current winter to the past decade here. His blog post got me to think more about how this winter has been completely back-ended when it comes to snow.

We started winter with little/no snow before Christmas. Many of us even wondered if the winter would go down with even less snow than the 2011/12 season! This graph shows the snowfall per month this winter versus normal. Typically, December is our snowiest month with 11.3 inches falling. Not so this go around! We got about twice as much snow as normal in both February and March! And the way this trend is heading, the snow could linger into April! -Eric

Posted under snow

We began this Winter with no snow to speak of until we hit mid December. It seemed as though the drought of 2012 might be sticking around into the new year. January didn’t help our odds much with a measly 2.7″ of snowfall. Then February came to town. We saw accumulating snow pile up in droves with 21.8″ falling in a mere 28 days. March has been fairly generous as well with 10.9″ of fresh powder adding to our totals. If we crunch the numbers and figure out how much snowfall we have seen in total for this Winter we find that number to be 38.5″. That puts us 0.4″ away from reaching the average seasonal snowfall in Rockford, and it is up from 24.3″ last. The only downside is the excess of cold air that has settled in lately. -Greg

Posted under snow, statistics, winter weather