Fast discussion on today's and tonights snow event.

Will leave fine tune the snowfall map some in a little.....However the dark blue shaded area looks like 4 to 6 inches will be more likely with some iso areas seeing 6 to 8 inches...That is if stronger instability can move in, this will depend on how strong the thunderstorms down to the South can become...The deformation areas does setup more to the North...From the Twin Cities over Eau Clarie Rice Lake and Ladysmith area....A dry slot if forecasted to move into Southeast MN and Southwestern WI so with our snowfall map those areas should see from 2 to 5 inches of snow....That areas would be from Rochester MN over around the Nesillsvile area of WI. Some areas with that area could see some 6 inches reports,however rule off thumb is to run with 2 to 5 inches of snow....

Updated snowfall map

In the dark blue is where we are forecasting snowfall amounts of 6 plus inches. We did talk about adding some 8 inch snowfall amounts in that area, however it does not look like a widespread deal,just a few reports of 8 inches may been seen,however 7 inches would be more the realm. The red area we are calling for 2 to 5 inches. The light blue 1 to 2 inches. This system is still not 100% written in stone yet so Dirk may have to change this map tomorrow morning. This snowfall amounts may be less if strong thunderstorms form to the South down over MO and so on.Just another reason why we didn't go higher in the forecasted amounts. Southern areas may also see less if this system moves 50 miles West/Northwest,as this would allow for more warmer air to drawn into those areas keeping more of a mix percip going.Still a lot of things to keep an eye on with this system. Can't stress this enough, this winter storm is not wriiten in stone in any shape or form yet.By tomorrow morning Dirk should have things all worked out. I rather hold off on issuing a forecast at this time due to reasons stated above.I was one the fence about updating the snowfall map I would have rather waited for the 0z runs to come in. I'm almost sure this will end up going back to the first map that was out on Wednesday.
Forecaster/Paul.

A weeee little chilly

A chilly night as of 10:52 PM it is 8.5 degrees....Good ice making weather...I sure hope we don't get any snow for about a good week or two!!!

Forecast will stand. Snowfall map will stand.

Am going to leave the ongoing forecast stand as is...Models today really not helping much,GFS still is way to South with the track of this system,While NAM and ECWMF have been hold the same track over the last few days...I really don't like Nam's output for QPF....However ongoing forecast and snowfall map was based more in the line with the ECWMF with a blend of NAM's QPF....The Gem model really hasn't been useful either....9 chances out of 10 I'm going to hold off on doing any major changes to the ongoing forecast, if needed it will be done tomorrow evening...Some of GFS memebers are slowly coming around to some with this storm system,seems like GFS is battling it's self now....Will leave snowfall map stand, there was some discussion about lowering some amounts way up North, and going an inch or two higher in the  South...Still looks like warm air may sneak into the far Southern areas to bring a mix on Saturday, and may even be a few hours of just plain rain in that area.This will hold down snowfall amounts...Central and Northern areas will be cold enough through the colum to produce all snow...
***TO RECAP***
Ongoing forecast stands..Snowfall map stands.... No changes are planed to the forecast....Changes will likely be map to snowfall map, reasons above...

This morning's pictures

Here are a few pictures taken this morning...We picked up an inch of snow from this system.

Below is the snow water equivalent.

Pictures from last night and this early morning snowfall

More pictures will be added once I get some in the day time later today.

Snowfall forecast.

This is our snowfall forecast for this upcoming weekend...This could change,but based on model data this is how it looks as of right now....NAM and ECWMF model are in good agreement on the track of the storm system, meanwhile GFS is way to South and Southeast....Would think we should see GFS get on track with the other models by Friday....Map made from a program,The program still has a few bugs to workout yet.