218
FXUS63 KMPX 121153
AFDMPX

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Twin Cities/Chanhassen MN
553 AM CST Wed Feb 12 2025

.KEY MESSAGES...

- Well-below normal temperatures continue through the next week
  with a brief warmup to near normal temperatures on Friday.

- Light snow likely across southern Minnesota & west-central
  Wisconsin today.

- More widespread snow likely Friday afternoon into Saturday
  with the best chances for accumulations over an inch in
  Wisconsin and parts of southern Minnesota.

&&

.DISCUSSION...
Issued at 146 AM CST Wed Feb 12 2025

Another cold night tonight, but not as cold as last night
thanks to the cloud cover limiting radiational cooling. Parts of
central Minnesota where the cloud cover has been lighter will
and has so far tonight seen cooler temperatures falling down to
near 20 below. The rest of the area has been and will continue
to be warmer. Temperatures warm as you head south with near zero
lows by the Iowa border.

Moving on to the snow chances today, the main low is well to
our south. This keeps the main area of synoptic forcing also to
our south. This doesn`t mean we won`t get snow, just that the
heaviest snow will remain to our south in Iowa. Even if we are
away from the main regions of forcing there is some weaker
forcing and enough moisture moving in along parts of southern
Minnesota into western Wisconsin for some snow to fall. QPF will
remain limited, but with a well saturated DGZ ratios could be
high and above our climatological normal snow ratios of around
14:1 and be closer to 15:1 to 20:1. It also is not unreasonable
to expect snow ratios above 20:1 to occur at times as we saw
last weekend. These ratios will be the area of greatest
forecast uncertainty today along the I-90 corridor. Snow ratios
staying in the lower end would be around an inch with the higher
end more around 3 to 4 inches of fluffy high ratio snow. This
kind of snow blows around easily and in many systems this would
create a blowing snow threat, but with the low so far away winds
are not expected to be high limiting this impact. Farther north
in areas like the Twin Cities drier air is expected to win out
more often than not with little to no accumulation expected.

Skies clear out again tonight as an arctic high moves in. This
will bring temperatures back down to well below normal. This
setup will be very similar to Monday night into Tuesday morning
with a clear sky and more so just cold rather than a
significantly higher wind chill due to gusty winds. Still even
with the lighter winds, wind chills will fall into the 20s and
30s below zero thanks to temperatures in the teens and 20s below
zero. The high pressure stays with us through the day tomorrow
with a cold, but sunny day expected.

Warmer air starts to advect in on Thursday night into Friday
providing us with our one warm up of the next week. Temperatures
will get back to near normal, although they will likely fall
short of normal values. Along with this warmer air will also be
the arrival of our next system and our more widespread chance of
snow. The WAA will also be one of the drivers for this snow as
the highest QPF and therefore snow if likely to occur in the
northeast quadrant of the surface low. This low will also be
much closer to us and therefore will provide more widespread
snow chances across Minnesota and Wisconsin. Doesn`t mean high
snow totals, but widespread accumulations are much more likely.
Still ensemble mean QPF does fall off quickly as you head
farther north and west with the to the ranges of 0.05" to 0.25"
in southern MN/western WI down to 0.00" to 0.02" in west
central Minnesota. For areas in between like the Twin Cities
that range would be more 0.02" to 0.1". With warmer air snow
ratios would not be as high and back down near climatology for
this time of year 12:1 to 15:1. Converting that over still gives
a large range for snow of 1 to 8 inches for the higher snow
accumulation regions of southern Minnesota and western
Wisconsin. As this system nears, confidence should increase
such that that range will tighten and give us a better idea of
how much snow we will see.

Cold air starts to move back in on Saturday on the back side of
this system. Sunday into next week will see more of the same,
much below normal temperatures with no prolonged warmup in
sight. On a weather basis it also looks like more systems
missing us to the south with arctic high pressure overhead.

&&

.AVIATION /12Z TAFS THROUGH 12Z THURSDAY/...
Issued at 547 AM CST Wed Feb 12 2025

Light snow spreads across southern Minnesota this morning & into
western Wisconsin by noon. MKT & EAU are expected to see the
most impacts from this storm with IFR visibility likely & 1-2"
of accumulation. Farther north, flurries or very light snow is
possible at RWF/MSP/RNH, but visibility should mostly stay VFR
or briefly MVFR. Ceilings will lower as the snow begins this
morning, with most locations hovering right at the VFR/MVFR
threshold into tonight. Clouds are expected to clear out after
midnight.

KMSP...Very dry air remains near the surface & will likely limit
the snow potential at MSP. At least a few hours of flurries or
very light snow is expected, especially this afternoon, but
visibility will most likely remain VFR. Ceilings drop to around
030kft this afternoon & remain there through this evening.


/OUTLOOK FOR KMSP/
THU PM...VFR. Wind SW 5-10 kts.
FRI...MVFR. -SN/IFR likely. Wind S 5-15 kts.
SAT...MVFR cigs, bcmg VFR. Wind N 5-10 kts.

&&

.MPX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
MN...Cold Weather Advisory from midnight tonight to 9 AM CST
     Thursday for Anoka-Benton-Blue Earth-Brown-Carver-
     Chippewa-Chisago-Dakota-Douglas-Faribault-Freeborn-
     Goodhue-Hennepin-Isanti-Kanabec-Kandiyohi-Lac Qui Parle-
     Le Sueur-Martin-McLeod-Meeker-Mille Lacs-Morrison-
     Nicollet-Pope-Ramsey-Redwood-Renville-Rice-Scott-
     Sherburne-Sibley-Stearns-Steele-Stevens-Swift-Todd-Waseca-
     Washington-Watonwan-Wright-Yellow Medicine.
WI...Cold Weather Advisory from midnight tonight to 9 AM CST
     Thursday for Barron-Dunn-Pierce-Polk-St. Croix.

&&

$$

DISCUSSION...NDC
AVIATION...ETA