Forecast discussion for Western/Northwestern WI

This forecast discussion will revolve around the possible major winter storm over Christmas eve and Christmas morning.....Near term forecast will have some light snow today then again on Wednesday....Still could see around an inch or 2 today,thinking is best areas to see that would South of of EAU CLAIRE while points north would see less...

***A POSSIBLE MAJOR WINTER STORM TO EFFECT THE AREA LATER IN THE UP COMING WEEK***

By all means this forecast is not set in stone in any shape or form....Forecasting models still all over the place with this system,however ECWMF has been the most constant so will Am going to lean towards that model the hardest ATTM..Also timing of the storm is still up in the air ,however still looks like it could effect the area over the time frame said above....The past few runs ECMWF has taken this storm more North....So while Am talking about the model lets break it down...

The 00z run shows a 1000 MB low pressure forming over Northern NM or Southern CO...ECWMF takes this low into Northern TX and deepens it to around 999 MBS....The low is forecasted to race Northeast towards the Northeast part of KS/Southwest part of IA...Also low is forecasted to deepen to around 981 MBS...Then the low tracks into Southern WI then across MI....With this track this would move the heaver snow more North and East then yesterday runs showed..So as of right now looks like all my forecast area could see significant snowfall accumulations...So ECWMF has been trending North with this system so for snow lovers of all ages that would be great news,however timing of this system is bad do to the Christmas holiday....Also looks like another wind jammer of a system...Which could lead to near blizzard conditions if this track pans out...

Now lets take a look at the GFS model....

GFS has trended a little more North on it's 00z run but still feel it's to far South compared to the rest of the middle and long range model.....This model has the system tracking from Eastern OK into Eastern Central MO then near Chicago,then through Southern MI....Also GFS shows this system to be much weaker around 1008 MBS by time it reaches Northeast IL....Just looked at GFS 06z run....GFS has come more in line with ECMWF....This run shows the system moving from Southwest MO Northeast to West of Chicago then North of Milwaukee WI then through the Northern part of MI...GFS still has this system weaker....About 1004 MBS by time it moves into WI....Either way the new track off of GFS is much better for significant snowfall accumulations across most of my forecast area...

Time to look at the GEM/GLB model....

Here 00z run from Gem/GLB has a 995 MB low pressure system forming over the TX panhandle....This model moves the system into Eastern KS then pushes the system up to the WI/IL border and deepens the low to around 991 MBS then tracks the low through Eastern WI into far Northwest MI...So this model is more in line with the ECMWF....

So to recap...looking at all the model data as of right now looks like we could be dealing with a major winter storm for the Christmas holiday.....People who have travel plans will want to keep up with the latest forecast from your local media,NOAA all hazards weather radios...Or just watch this forecasting blog for the latest on this possible major winter storm....The only reason am talking about this this early in the game is because of the Christmas holiday and many people will be on the road networks....This could turn out to be a dangerous winter storm...Timing of this is just bad...



Note number 1....


Once again this forecast is not set in stone! however over the next day or two the finer details will be worked out and I will have a better handle on this.....

Note number two...

With the area lakes having ice on them...Some of the lakes still are not safe...Best advise I give here is for sure keep your kids off the ice....With the lakes freezing over and the snows we had the ice has not really got that thick yet...I found this out yesterday while checking out some of the lakes....One can go from 3-4 inches of ice down to an inch of ice in a matter of feet's....If you must fish like me...be very careful out on the ice as it changes real fast!