The first will pour significant snow from the central plain to the mid-Atlantic coast until Tuesday night. The deepest snow will pile up in Iowa. Part of the snow will be very intense, with snowfall rates of up to 2 inches per hour, according to the Weather Forecast Center.
“If these snow totals materialize, they would be very rare for Iowa,” the Des Moines National Meteorological Service wrote.
“On average, individual daily snowfalls of one foot or more only historically occur every 15 to 20 years.”
If a foot of snow falls in Des Moines in one day, it will only be the tenth time it has fallen a foot or more since 1884. The last time they saw so much snow in one day was in 2004.
“Snow in the midwest is not uncommon,” said CNN meteorologist Chad Myers, who spent years forecasting snow on the plains.
What makes this system weird is how much it is expected to drop in a day. Des Moines is much more likely to see on a foot of snow over two or three days.
“This storm with such a wide area of 12 to 18 inches can extend road cleaning resources,” Myers said. “Be prepared to be trapped for a few days.”
Outside Iowa, more than 4 inches of snow is expected from Kansas to Michigan.
Not only snow can cause problems. Ice could accumulate south of the snow that stretched from Kansas to New Jersey. It could form up to a tenth of an inch of ice with localized spots of up to a quarter of an inch.
“According to the prediction center,” travel can become dangerous quickly through areas of this region. ”
Rain will fall in the southeast, where daily temperatures will exceed average. Severe storms can develop across the Mississippi River Valley, including eastern Arkansas and western Tennessee.
The atmospheric river on the west coast could bring record snow
Another system is expected to boost the region from Tuesday to Wednesday.
“The weekday system that aligns with a wave of atmospheric humidity has the potential to throw an extreme amount of rainfall, possibly flirting with record lengths of snowfall, in portions of southern California and western Great Basin said Jenn Varian, a meteorologist with the Las Vegas Weather Service.
Sierra Nevada is expected to take on the weight of moisture with this system, Varian said, but an additional spill could be possible depending on the heights of the storms.
Mountain ridges could see from 60 to 100 inches of snow from Tuesday evening to Friday morning.
Northwestern California, as of Monday, seems likely to record rainfall. “Moisture plumes with RA (atmospheric river) events are always complicated and they may not know more details until the event begins to unfold,” the San Francisco National Weather Service office said.
Atmospheric rivers are long, narrow regions of the atmosphere, such as rivers in the sky, that carry water vapor, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Total rain forecast from Tuesday to Thursday night ranges from 2.5 to 4.5 inches at lower elevation locations. In comparison, the hills could see 6 to 8 inches, even isolated amounts of 10 to 13 inches of rain.
Before this system in weeks, much of the region will face stiff winds. Warnings and strong wind warnings are issued from Los Angeles to Phoenix, where winds will blow today from 45 to 55 mph.
From Tuesday to Wednesday, winds could loosen up to 60 mph across areas of California.