Heavy Snow in the Cascades and Northern Rockies; Wintry Mix in the Northeast; High Winds in Southern California

Two more cold fronts will pass through the Northwest U.S. this week with heavy mountain snow continuing across the Cascades, and northern Rockies. A quick moving storm system will bring mixed precipitation including some freezing rain across the Northeast U.S. today. High winds could blow down trees and power lines in the mountains of southern California this evening through Thursday. Read More >

Heavy Snow Event

March 6, 2008

On 6 March 2008, a convective precipitation band formed across North Texas and quickly transitioned from rain to snow in a 60 km wide zone extending from west of the Dallas / Fort Worth metroplex northeast into extreme North Texas near the Red River. The snow persisted for over three hours with accumulations averaging 7 cm and isolated reports up to 30 cm near the heaviest convective precipitation. Frontogenesis and the resulting ageostrophic circulation appeared to play key roles in not only providing significant forcing for ascent but also in modifying the vertical temperature profile to be supportive of a liquid-to-frozen precipitation transition. The presence of atmospheric instability led to isolated thunderstorm development, with occasional cloud-to-ground and in-cloud lightning observed in the band of heavy snow. This study reviews the complex interactions between moisture, instability, and forcing for ascent that occurred during this convective winter weather event.

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Heavy Snow in the Cascades and Northern Rockies; Wintry Mix in the Northeast; High Winds in Southern California

March 6, 2008 Snow