Warm air currently over the Northern Plains and western Minnesota is pushing quickly to the E-SE this evening and will continue to move farther south/east through Sunday morning.
Source: https://www.spc.noaa.gov/
Right on the edge of the warm air advection we’re seeing an area of snow which is impacting far northeast Minnesota this Saturday evening. The snow is moving to the east-southeast.
With the changing airmasses, we are getting a very intense low level jet (~5000 feet) to develop. Strongest winds aloft are currently over the Northern Plains (60-80 knots) but this area of strong winds will shift farther south/east on Sunday. Note: Not all of this will mix down to the surface, but we’re likely to get wind gusts of 20 to around 45 mph over parts of the Northland on Sunday.
Source: https://www.spc.noaa.gov/
We’ve got quite a strong jet stream roaring in off the Pacific right now.
Source: Goes-16 water vapor image; https://weather.cod.edu/
Goes-16 water vapor loop from Saturday, February 1, 2020.
Source: 18z NAM-WRF model 2.1.20; https://weathermodels.com/
What a difference a year makes! 58% of Lake Superior was covered by ice on February 1st, 2019, but fast forward to this year, and Lake Superior ice coverage is only at 7.5%! The average for early February is ~35%. Note: In 2019, ice coverage on Lake Superior peaked at ~94%. Highly unlikely will get anywhere near last year’s amount for the rest of this winter.
Low temperature forecast for Sunday morning, February 2, 2020. Source: https://graphical.weather.gov/
High temperature forecast for Sunday, February 2, 2020.
…Weather Summary…
Strong area of low pressure passes north and east of our area tonight and Sunday. Warm air advection out ahead of this system is leading to an area of snow and patchy mixed precipitation this evening in northeast Minnesota with snowfall accumulations of a half inch or less except in the tip of the Arrowhead where up to 2 inches of snow is possible by early Sunday morning including for the Gunflint Trail, Grand Marais, Hovland and Grand Portage areas.
Mostly cloudy to partly cloudy skies are expected tonight with lows in the 20s to lower 30s, but temperatures will be rising toward daybreak.
A strong cold front blasts through the Northland Sunday morning, the main impact from this front will be the gusty winds which develop early Sunday morning, with gusty winds expected to continue through most of the day Sunday. Winds will be out of the west to northwest at 15 to 25 mph with gusts to 45 mph.
Highs on Sunday will range from the middle 30s to middle 40s.
Mostly cloudy to partly sunny skies are forecast on Sunday with some snow or mixed showers possible mainly in northern Minnesota.
Temperatures will cool off starting on Monday with highs ranging from around 20 to 30 degrees, even cooler Tuesday with highs in the teens which is a lot closer to where we should be in early February.
Note: I don’t see a whole lot of snow affecting the Northland at least through next week, and possibly right through mid-month. Computer models really aren’t showing much in terms of major winter storms affecting our area for the next 1-2 weeks, will see if that trend continues to show up in coming days.
Forecast for Duluth and Superior
.Tonight… Partly to mostly cloudy. Low 25 to 30. Wind south to southwest 5 to 15 mph.
.Sunday… Windy. Partly to mostly cloudy. High 39 to 44. Wind west to northwest 20 to 35 mph with gusts to 45 mph.
.Monday… Cooler. Partly to mostly cloudy. High 23 to 28. Wind west to northwest 10 to 20 mph.
| Normal temperatures for February 2 High 21 Low 2 Sunrise Sunday 7:32 AM CST Sunset Sunday 5:13 PM CST |
Thanks for reading!
Tim
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