7:37 PM Wednesday, April 13, 2022
A strong spring storm will continue to affect the Northland through Thursday and possibly even into Friday.
Dual surface lows will continue to lift slowly NNE as they meet north of Lake Superior during the day Thursday while a strong upper-level low pressure system heads ENE out of North Dakota passing over the Northland on Thursday then exiting off to the NE on Friday.
- A band of snow, heavy at times will continue to lift north-northwest across northern Minnesota and Arrowhead tonight with several inches of wet slushy snow likely by daybreak on Thursday. Note: Duluth Airport picked up a quick 1.5″ of snow under this heavy snow band late this afternoon.
- Some rain or a mix of rain and snow will affect parts of northwest Wisconsin this evening before ending overnight.
- East-central Minnesota including the Twin Ports should be mostly dry for the rest of tonight although some patchy drizzle or snow showers can’t be ruled out.
- The weather on Thursday will feature a mix bag of conditions with some partial sun possible at times, while snow showers occur at other times, and some of these snow showers could be heavy for brief periods of time especially in the afternoon after we build up some weak instability.
- With the upper low moving over the Northland on Thursday this will lead to a possibility for heavy snow squall development during the afternoon and early evening with brief near whiteout conditions possible in parts of the Northland.
Simulated radar forecast through 7 PM Thursday.
The upper trough and upper-level low moving east out of the Dakotas is unusually strong for this time of year as noted by the purple colors on the animation below.
500mb height anomaly forecast through 7 PM Friday.
A Winter Weather Advisory has been issued for far northern Minnesota and also for parts of the North Shore and Arrowhead from 7 PM this evening to 7 PM Thursday.
Travel could become difficult in the advisory area due to wet accumulating snow which may accumulate on roads especially tonight into Thursday morning.
Some cities included in the advisory, International Falls, Orr, Crane Lake, Ely, Isabella and Grand Marais.
Snowfall accumulations of 3 to 6 inches with locally higher amounts are possible through Friday morning across far northern Minnesota into the Arrowhead with snow amounts generally in the trace to 3-inch range for the rest of the Northland but it is April and a lot of the snow that falls at least during the day could melt on contact.
An area of strong upper-level winds is lifting north across the upper Midwest this afternoon which has led to an area of stronger vertical lift which has caused the rain to mix with and change to wet snow in some parts of east-central Minnesota and in the Twin Ports this afternoon.
A band of precipitation stretching from west-central and northern Wisconsin into northern Minnesota continues to lift NNW with heavier precipitation in green colors on the animation below. This precipitation is falling as snow in northern Minnesota while rain or a mix is occurring in northern Wisconsin early this evening.
Radar loop ending 7:20 PM Wednesday, April 13, 2022.
A look at the powerful spring storm which is affecting a large part of the U.S. today.
Moisture streaming north out of the Gulf of Mexico, then NW into Wisconsin and northern Minnesota, then the moisture pushes south into the Northern Rockies and Northern Plains to fuel the ongoing blizzard over those areas.
Goes-16 water vapor loop.
Severe weather occurring over the Mid-South, lower and middle Mississippi valley and lower Ohio Valley today (colder cloud tops show up as orange and deep red colors on the loop below.
Goes-16 infrared satellite loop.
Gusty NE winds will continue over the Arrowhead tonight (20 to 30 mph) while winds across the rest of the Northland relax a bit compared to the high winds that occurred last night and this morning especially near Lake Superior.
Winds increase once again Thursday with southwest winds gusting 20 to 30 mph with even higher gusts possible, and another blustery day is likely Friday with a northwest wind gusting 25 to around 40 mph.
Note: At the peak of last night’s wind event, Minnesota Power reported 23 outages affecting 10,510 customers in the Duluth and Eveleth areas!
Wind gust forecast through 7 PM Friday.
PEAK WIND GUSTS FROM TUESDAY EVENING-WEDNESDAY MORNING, APRIL 12-13, 2022
Duluth Airport: 59 mph
Bay of Grand Marais, MN: 55 mph
1 N Port Wing, WI: 53 mph
Duluth Sky Harbor Airport, MN: 49 mph
Two Harbors, MN: 48 mph
Duluth Harbor, MN: 45 mph
Saginaw, MN: 44 mph
Devils Island: 43 mph
Cloquet, MN: 40 mph
Chisolm-Hibbing Airport: 39 mph
Superior Airport: 38 mph
Esko, MN: 37 mph
Cotton, MN: 37 mph
French River, MN: 36 mph
Isabella, MN: 36 mph
Hayward, WI: 36 mph
Bayfield, WI: 35 mph
Brainerd, MN: 35 mph
International Falls, MN: 35 mph
24-HOUR PRECIPITATION REPORTS THROUGH 4 PM WEDNESDAY, APRIL 13, 2022, VIA MESO-WEST DATA
Glidden, WI: 1.28″
Hayward, WI: 1.11″
Clam Lake, WI: 0.99″
Siren, WI: 0.91″
Orr, MN: 0.77″
Minong, WI: 0.76″
Bigfork, MN: 0.66″
Littlefork, MN: 0.65″
Isabella, MN: 0.65″
Ely, MN: 0.64″
Moose Lake, MN: 0.56″
Washburn, WI: 0.55″
Eveleth-Virgina, MN: 0.53″
Ashland, WI: 0.45″
Chisholm-Hibbing Airport: 0.43″
Solon Springs, WI: 0.36″
Duluth, MN (Airport) 0.35″
International Falls, MN: 0.32″
Two Harbors, MN: 0.28″
Cloquet, MN: 0.28″
Cass Lake, MN: 0.27″
Grand Marais Airport: 0.21″
Walker, MN: 0.19″
Grand Rapids, MN: 0.15″
Hill City, MN: 0.08″
Brainerd, MN: 0.03″
This will be the next system to keep an eye on (low over eastern Wyoming) as it could bring another round of wet snow to parts of the Northland sometime Sunday afternoon into Monday morning.
Thanks for reading!
Tim
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