I told you they would change the Winter Storm Watch. It’s now a Winter Storm Warning for this afternoon through midday Tuesday. It covers the viewing area from Bullitt County northward. All of Southern Indiana is included. The rest of the area except for Hart, Green, Adair and Taylor counties are under a winter weather advisory.
Pretty much the same story as yesterday. We go all snow until around midnight, then sleet then freezing rain until around sunrise followed by a cold rain. Plan on a difficult rush hour this afternoon and particularly for Tuesday morning. Freezing rain on top of snow will be a real mess.
The trick here will be the snow amounts. I had suggested a conservative 2 to 4 inches with locally heavier amounts knowing full well that the models were indicating more. Now, they’ve even gone heavier. The top one has us in the dark green, which is 4-6 inches. The grey in the western part of the viewing area indicates 6-8 inches. The bottom map has us barely in the grey, which is 6-8 inches and the blues in southern Indiana reflecting 8-12 inches. But….if sleet mixes in, then the amounts will be reduced.
Our air is very dry so the early snow will be a light fluffy snow that may end up showing up as closer to a 15-1 or even 20-1 ratio of liquid conversion to snow. So, for instance, the bottom model indicates .24″ of precipitation this afternoon. Normally, you expect about a 10-1 ratio so that would equal 2.4″ of snow. But, if we had 20-1, then that would be 4.8″ of snow. For now, we’re going with 3-6 inches with locally higher amounts. At this point, I don’t think that the snow amount differences will be all that consequential. I feel like that, pragmatically, its the ice. If it falls more as sleet, then it won’t be so bad. But, there are indications that the freezing rain portion of the event may be broader in time. I had suggested a quarter to a half inch of ice and that is still a distinct possibility. Should that happen…particularly when you get toward a half inch..then power outages become more likely. As mentioned previously, that is the only weather event in which I do not want to be involved. My cats aren’t fat enough to keep both me and Snow White warm and you know which of us will win the battle for the cats. It’s one of those situations when Nit and Wit suddenly become her cats and not mine.
Stay tuned to see the ultimate outcome. Hopefully, we can just have mainly a nice fluffy snow and avoid the ice, though it seems remote that we will avoid the ice altogether.
