WINTER STORM UPDATE, IT'S HERE...

Snow has overspread the region as of mid-evening and is falling moderate to heavy in many locations. Roads have become snow covered and travel is far from good. In southwest Iowa where up to a foot of snow has fallen travel is not recommended by the Iowa DOT. West bound I-80 was closed near Newton, Iowa due to an accident at last report. Here are the DOT road conditions which show snow covered roads over much of the area from HWY 20 south. Very difficult travel is reported west and SW of Des Moines.

Here's some DOT cameras showing snow covered roads and interstates.

Iowa City

Waterloo

Cedar Rapids

Quad Cities

It will be a slow go if you must travel around the area and the state of Iowa tonight.

I have some new snowfall forecasts from newly released models as of mid-evening as well. This is additional snow on top of what has fallen through 6:00pm. There is a clear trend to push the heaviest snows further north. That centers the 6-10" band now more between HWY 20 and I-80. The heaviest amounts are still anticipated to be in Iowa. The hi-res models are showing some 10-12 in amounts in a corridor from HWY 30 (Cedar Rapids) to Waterloo and Dubuque along HWY 20). That's not a sure thing but those numbers are consistently showing up.

The EURO

The 12K NAM

The 3K NAM

The HRRR

Snow will continue into the morning hours Tuesday (especially near and north of I-80) before tapering off in the afternoon from west to east.

I do have some snow reports to show but they have been rather meager and for some reason the NWS in Des Moines, which has seen some large totals is not reporting. Thus there is a big hole in the IEM data that you can see below. So far 4-5" amounts have been reported in my area concentrated around Iowa City. Again, while the map shows no snow out around Des Moines I would estimate at least 6 inches has fallen. It's odd that we are are not getting info out of that office.

That is where things stand at the moment. I will have another post after 10 including an update on another potential snow system Saturday night or Sunday. It looks interesting! Roll weather and white gold....TS

A SECOND PRINTING OF MY NEW BOOK IS ON THE WAY...

250 NEW COPIES OF DERECHO 911, IOWA'S INLAND HURRICANE ARE AVAILABLE. Around Christmas we sold the last of the 1500 copies of our book on this historic thunderstorm, the most damaging in U.S. history. Due to continued demand we have ordered a limited number of 250 for those of you interested in having the most authoritative account of this extreme event. You can get yours at derechobook.com