Hoosier

This would be an easy 3-6" type lake enhanced around the southern end of Lake Michigan on Thursday if it were a bit colder. But the marginal thermal profiles (especially early on) are a problem which will hurt accumulations. Could be a sweet spot that is in the band but far enough inland to escape some of the marine warmth and accumulate more efficiently but it is too early to try to figure that out.

Some lake enhancement does look likely, probably starting out around Chicago metro before shifting into IN/MI. Can't rule out some rain or more of a mix at first but as 850 mb temps drop, all snow should be seen even all the way to the shoreline. Lake temps generally running in the mid-upper 40s will yield delta T initially in the mid teens before increasing to around 20C.

I like the pivotal map better. The wave that contributes to Thursday's snow is still in no man's land well north of Alaska so definitely could see some model shifting to come... hopefully for the better.

System later this week has trended a little better.

Yeah not holding my breath on that one... at least as far as something that deep. Just a general thought going forward this season... some of these extremely cold GFS runs have me wondering if we are going to see an extreme cold discharge into the CONUS at some point. We had the extreme cold at the end of January this year and going back into the 1980s and 1990s, there are multiple cases of extreme cold getting into the Midwest in back to back winters or just skipping over 1 winter. Heck there has already been some impressive cold especially out west.

GFS is trying with that storm next week. Just not good enough. Need to bring the northern stream wave in farther west. The 18z ICON is what happens when that happens.

I commented in the Lakes sub how that run has 2m temps in the single digits in IA/IL in the afternoon on the 12th. A total clown show.

12z Euro is a bit south. Does manage to have a band of lake enhanced snow around here as 850 mb temps pushing -10C are cold enough to overcome the still relative bath water of Lake Michigan.

That GFS storm is a total freakshow. Besides wrecking the shorelines as it occludes and slows down, it has afternoon temps still in the single digits in parts of IA/IL on Nov 12th.

Watching mid to late week

That is a thing of beauty to watch on a loop.

498 dm thicknesses lol

There will be some warmups but it looks below average overall. It is quite something to see the cold air available to tap into at this time of year. I could definitely envision another snow or two around here over the next week or two.

From LOT With last winter lingering through April and this early season snow, there was not much time between snowfall events for the off season. In fact the 185 days between accumulating snow events (>= 0.1 in) for Chicago was the 6th shortest stretch of days on record for the city. When looking at between 1"+ events, the 185 days was actually tied for the shortest stretch with 1967.

Cold night to start.

Ended up right around 1.5" here. Noticed the same thing some of you mentioned about varying accumulations. Most of the grass was covered but there were small areas of grass that had nothing, and it wasn't necessarily a tree thing either as some areas under trees were totally covered and other areas had the "tree shadow." Kind of strange. Relatively small total compared to areas farther north/west but no complaints. It ripped hard for a time and provided for a memorable day. Doubt I will ever witness it snow that hard on Halloween again.

About to take off for LaSalle but quick pic. Lol @ that branch hanging toward the ground with all of 0.5" of snow

ORD has ticked down to 31 and MDW 32.

What a map at noon central on halloween.

IN/MI shorelines are going to get a beating with the high lake level.

Snowing lightly

It looks like area to watch for maximum tree impact is a zone just inland to the west of Lake Michigan... possibly including ORD area. That area sort of combines the factors the best -- winds a bit stronger than areas farther west and temps not dropping below freezing as quickly.

PIA is reporting freezing rain. I wonder how many times that has happened before November.

Let's do it

What? Sustained winds will be around 15-25 mph throughout the afternoon before slacking during evening. I wouldn't call that weak.