Our Sunday was a rude awakening compared to the rest of last week. Cold air brought frigid temperatures back for the day across most of the state. There was a 50 degree temperature difference in the afternoon between NW and SE OK. Scattered showers moved through and even some frozen precipitation across NW OK that caused travel issues. Amounts of precipitation at the time of this blog entry were fairly light with still several hours to go before the event ends.
Temperatures Sunday afternoon.
Rain amounts by midday.
Things will quiet down again for a few days before the next wave of cold air moves in on Thursday and an upper level storm system moves overhead. The fire danger will be high until we can get some widespread significant moisture. The drought is quite strong currently.
Current drought conditions.
Friday will be the worst day as temperatures at midday will be in the 20s with wind chill values in the single digits again with north winds gusting over 30 mph. As the upper system moves through Thursday night, expect light freezing rain and sleet to break out again across the I-44 corridor and into SE OK. Any icy stuff will make a quick transition to snow by morning however, and become quite heavy into parts of E OK before exiting the state mid-afternoon. So expect some travel issues on Friday. Most of the European ensembles blend to at least an inch of snow in OKC. It’s early though, so these amounts will change.
Temperatures midday Friday.
Wind chills midday Friday.
Animation of precipitation. (Tap/click)
Ensemble snow output for OKC.
Early snowfall estimates.
Freezing rain and sleet expected.
After that quick deep freeze, temperatures will rebound into the weekend. I’ll be watching this system closely with updates during the week. -AT
OKC Temperature Trend.
