A White Christmas?

Something that crosses everyone's mind before the big Christmas holiday: "Will we have a White Christmas?" There's nothing quite like waking up on Christmas morning with fresh snow on the ground. But that is not a very common occurrence for many locations across the country, especially along and south of Interstate 70. Rockford fares much better with the probability of at least 1" of snow on the ground on Christmas ranging from 40%-50%. However, that is just a historical probability. Every year is different based off of the pattern that evolves each December. This year we are under the influence of a strong El Niño, which is known to bring warmer than average temperatures to the northern half of the United States. Thus far, it has not disappointed. November finished above average in the temperature department across the Stateline, and December has started very mild with record high temperatures being threatened on multiple occasions.

So with the above average temperatures thus far this season, does our chance of seeing a White Christmas drastically drop? Not necessarily.

The pattern in the coming weeks continues to look colder with a dip in the jet stream becoming more pronounced across the eastern half of the country. Models continue showing a few warm bulges between the 15th and Christmas Day, but for the most part, temperatures look much colder than that have been recently. In fact, the models have suggested some truly arctic air moving into the United States from Canada for the last ten days or so of the month. Here is the temperature outlook for the days leading up to Christmas.

Note the large intrusion of very cold air that is making its way into the Lower 48. Now, it is important to remember this is only a forecast model's prediction for what could happen. But it is also important to note that this trend has continued to show up on the long-range forecast models, so a colder pattern is likely. Will it be quite this cold? That is difficult to say as of now.


In terms of the snow probabilities as we make our way towards Christmas Day, there are a few storm systems that could bring some wintry precipitation our way. Again, this involves looking more than a week into the future. Oftentimes, the forecast models can struggle to pinpoint storm systems when they are that far out into the future. But the chances for snow have continued to show up on our long-range forecasting models, which is important. When looking that far into the future, looking at trends is important as opposed to discussing the likelihood of snow and snowfall totals. And, as of now, the trend is for colder weather that could support some snow for the Midwest and Great Lakes later this month.

This means our chances of seeing a White Christmas are by no means zero.