swas blog

Heavy snow is possible today across parts of the central Plains and central High Plains, with 1 to 2 feet of snow expected in the Denver area. Blizzard Warnings are in effect for the central High Plains. Meanwhile, severe weather is possible across parts of the Southern Plains today.

What will become a large storm system over the central and southern Rockies is currently organizing out west and will bring heavy snow with strong winds, severe weather and heavy rain to parts of the central U.S. over the next couple of days.

Heavy snow will continue in the high terrain of northwest Washington as a cold front sweeps across the region. Total snow accumulations of 10 to 20 inches are expected in the northern Cascades above 3,000 feet by Wednesday morning. Meanwhile, 6 to 11 inches are possible in the Olympics. Winter weather will make travel difficult in the passes at times. Meanwhile, rain is expected in the lower elevations, including the Seattle and Olympia metro areas.

While much of the country enjoys warm and tranquil weather, bitterly cold temperatures settled into northern Alaska bringing dangerous wind chill values of 50 to 75 degrees below zero. Meanwhile, strong Santa Ana winds continued over southern California although not as strong as Friday. Strong winds were also common over portions of Montana and Wyoming where High Wind Watches and Warnings were posted. High pressure and pleasant weather remained the main focus from the Great Lakes to the East Coast.

The system that brought severe weather to the deep south earlier this week is now shifting to the east. Severe Thunderstorm Warnings and Tornado Watches are in effect for portions of the southeastern U.S. tonight.

The NWS Storm Prediction Center has issued a Slight Risk for severe thunderstorms today from Eastern Texas into parts of Louisiana and Mississippi.

A large geomagnetic storm (a type of solar storm) — the largest such storm since October 2003 — is currently underway. The storm remains at S3 (strong) levels but has dropped below its peak and will continue to slowly decrease throughout the day. Impacts so far include some airlines avoiding polar routes and reports of flights at high latitudes flying at lower than usual altitudes.

Geomagnetic storms (a type of solar storm) occur when a mass of energy is ejected from the sun and hits earth’s magnetic field. These storms are rated from G1 to G5 with G5 being the strongest. Tomorrow’s storm is forecast to reach G2 in strength with isolated G3 strength in the higher latitudes. A G3 storm could potentially cause some disruptions to the power grid, however, information about this well forecast event has been disseminated to power companies, which are able to reroute the grids to accommodate any energy surges that may occur as a result of a solar storm.