Winter Storm Tracks: Which One Leads to Snow

In what should be, climatologically, our snowiest month it seems as if that four letter word has been lost with all the recent rain and record breaking warmth.  But we are getting into that time of year when we need to pay closer attention to storm tracks, especially those that come out of the southwest. 

The early season snow that came down one week before Thanksgiving packed quite a punch with over a foot of snow falling.  What's even more impressive is it came in from the northwest, not the southwest where we typically get those strong low pressure systems.

A storm track that would be more favorable for heavy, accumulating snow in northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin would be low pressure that lifts northeast from the Oklahoma/Texas panhandle to St. Louis, south of Springfield and near Indianapolis.  With this type of track, there would be enough cold air in place as moisture is pulled north from the Gulf of Mexico.  As the moisture interacts with the cold air, heavy snow would occur.  Usually a lot of wind comes with this type of storm track as well.

For a wintry mix, including a rain/snow mix, sleet and freezing rain, low pressure would track from the southwest, north of St. Louis to near the Quad Cities and very close to northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin.  This type of track would favor a warmer start, but as the low moves closer and passes the cold air tries to win out.  This would cause temperatures to be very close to freezing at the surface and above, increasing the chance of a wintry mix.

And just like we had this past weekend, a storm track to the west and northwest keeps us on the warmer side with the heavy snow falling across the Plains and Midwest, and rain falling to the east.  The most favorable track for this scenario is low pressure lifting near Kansas City, west of Galena and into northern Wisconsin.

It's important to remember these types of weather scenarios are not completely set in stone and sometimes different outcomes can occur, all depending on what else is going on in the atmosphere.

Looking ahead into next week, since we are less than two weeks away from Christmas, it does appear another large system will affect the country.  The track has been shifting quite a bit, and that's to be expected this far out.  But a possible scenario would be rain leading up to Christmas Eve day, with a brief cool down for Christmas.  Whether or not that cool down will produce any snow is yet to be seen.  But I would bet we have a higher chance of seeing rain than we do snow this year.