Wintry Week Ahead

More Wintry weather likely for Tuesday and potentially again later this week. Another wave of low pressure will move along a stalled front to our Southeast. This will spread another round of Wintry precipitation back into Arkansas by Tuesday morning.

The pink areas indicate a mix of freezing and sleet.  The greatest threat for significant icing is over Ashley and Chicot Counties in Southeast Arkansas where the National Weather Service has issued an ice storm warning through Tuesday evening.

Enough icing may occur in the warning area that travel will become dangerous, as well as ice buildup on trees and power lines is likely. Power outages are possible in the warning area with more than a quarter inch of ice accumulation possible. The area shaded in purple indicates a Winter Weather Advisory, where some sleet and freezing rain is likely, but accumulations will not be enough to cause significant problems. Little Rock and the metro area is not included in the advisory at this time. A few slick spots are possible on some of the roads, especially overpasses, but overall impact will be low. All precipitation will end across the State by Tuesday evening.

The Winter Weather  may have even more in store for Arkansas later in the week. A strong upper air disturbance will approach from the West early Thursday morning.

This disturbance will develop a wave of low pressure along the front stalled to our Southeast. Some of the computer models are now indicating that moisture associated with the wave will wrap around the upper disturbance.

This would bring potentially heavy snowfall into Central Arkansas Thursday. This solution is now indicated by a couple of computer models, including our own high resolution Microcast. Below is the forecast radar for 10 AM Thursday.

Some of the computer models show a much different solution, however, in which the moisture does not wrap around the upper level low. This would result in very little precipitation for Arkansas. Below is a different computer model run for the same time Thursday morning.

Due to the completely different solutions offered by the computer models, the forecast for Thursday is very low confidence. It is important, however, to keep in mind that a Winter Storm is at least possible later this week. While it is far too early to talk snow amounts with any degree of reliability, our computer model does show some significant amounts.

Keep in mind this is just one forecast model, and not an actual forecast. The big question is how much moisture warps around the upper air low pressure system, which will determine whether or not we get accumulating snowfall or barely anything at all.