Nov 28: Two Major Winter Storms Ahead

Black Friday brought rounds of lake effect snow to parts of Upstate New York. Flakes were flying for much of the day around Syracuse:

As our big weekend winter storms ramps up, the lake effect snow will wind down. The WPC has great key messages to follow for making your travel plans to avoid the worst times: 

First up in the path of the weekend storm is the Northern Plains. Lighter amounts for the Dakotas in the 3-5" range but totals across Eastern Nebraska, Southeast South Dakota, Southern Minnesota, and Iowa will be in the 8-12" and even 12-18" range:

The snow has already started across the Dakotas but the heaviest snow will start overnight Friday and last for much of the day tomorrow, especially across Iowa. Travel on I-80 and I-35 should be avoided at all costs until Sunday. The below future radar is valid from 6 pm CT Fri night to 12 am CT Sun:

From there, the system sets its sights on the Upper Midwest and Great Lakes with impressive snow totals expected again. 8-12" and some spots with over a foot of snow are expected across Northern Illinois, Northwestern Indiana, and into Western Michigan:

Timing for this region will be for snow to start Saturday morning and last much of the day and into Sunday. The below future radar is valid from to 12 am CT Saturday 10 am CT on Sunday. Some interstates to avoid travel on include I-90, I-94, I-80 and I-65:

On the southern side of the system, severe storms are possible from I-35 eastward across Texas and parts of Western Louisiana. The main risk will be damaging winds and some hail with an isolated tornado threat:

The Eastern US will get mostly light precipitation as the main energy from the system moves into Canada: 

Behind the weekend system, the cold air sets in across the Eastern US and the first 5 days of December (and meteorological winter) will be well below average:

This is going to set the stage for yet another storm system to bring a swath of snow to parts of the Ohio Valley to interior Northeast and New England. We have a few days to iron out the details for this but the ensemble snow forecast from the Euro is below. Not as heavy snow amounts currently anticipated with this system but something to monitor:

Perhaps more importantly from next week's system is the significant rain that will fall across the South, including the Florida panhandle: 

This area has seen a big increase in drought conditions over the last few months so this rain will be welcome: