- Nov 1, 2017

COOL IS THE RULE AS NOVEMBER TAKES THE STAGE....

A month ago (October 1st), snow cover was limited around the Northern Hemisphere to the polar latitudes.

Since that time, especially the past 10 days, snowcover has expanded and begun to push south. This is what coverage looks like October 30th thanks to the Rutgers Snow Lab. It's more than tripled.

Here's another perspective.

With the snow cover expanding up north temperatures are rapidly cooling in Canada. In fact a very cold reservoir of air covers much of that country. The pink areas north of Manitoba indicate 850mb temperatures (about 1 mile up) of 20-25 below C. That's eye opening for so early in the season.

Interestingly enough, the biggest 850 departures are found over my area and the central Midwest, not Canada. This points to how cold this air mass is here in the heartland. In other words, the cold is more common in Canada this early than it is here in the Midwest.

The high in Cedar Rapids Tuesday was just 37 degrees. That makes this the coldest Halloween day since 1996 (21 years ago). That year we reached 34. Up in Minnesota where there is snow cover, highs held in the mid 20s.

In Duluth, Minnesota where 10" of snow fell last weekend, more is expected Wednesday. Here's the story board from the Duluth NWS office. The northland winter is off to a very fast start.

The GFS shows snowfall totals that look like this the next 16 days. The rich get richer and the snow grows higher in Canada....so too will the cold.

Aside from the snow over the northern tier, much of the rest of the nation will see relatively quiet weather the next 2 weeks. A series of large highs will dominate the pattern limiting moisture while delivering shallow cool air to the Midwest. For the most part, temperatures should be near to below normal much of the next 10 days, especially if the EPO remains negative.

Here's one of those big 1030mb highs a week from now pulling in cool dry air mass off the snow cover in Canada.