Hoosier

Impressive to see subfreezing temps being modeled during the afternoon

Besides the daily snowfall records, there are a couple other things that *could* come into play for Chicago if trends don't reverse. The most snow to fall in a season from April 14 on is 6.9" in 1910. ORD currently has 5.4" If Chicago were to receive at least 1", it appears that it would be the first time that 2 separate storm systems/complexes have produced 1"+ from April 14 on in the same season. Note that this is not the same thing as having multiple calendar days from April 14 on with 1"+ snow, which has happened in a couple instances when a storm spanned multiple days.

Gotta admit that part of me is rooting for the weekend storm to come south. I'd be perfectly fine with farther north though. Right now it's in between crap zone which is probably the most likely outcome.

Probably somewhat higher tree damage potential than the storm a couple weeks ago with spring bloom being farther along.

Impressive

Was looking at some late season snows in the last few days of April or later and to say that climo is hostile for accumulating snow south of about the WI-IL border is an understatement. Rockford doesn't have a 2" calendar day snow after April 23 and there are very few 1" snows after that day.

LOT might put out an advisory like 2 days in advance if models come into agreement with this.

Almost feels like we are entering the theater of the absurd from a weather perspective. Anyway, looks like mainly MN-WI-MI under the gun at this time but adjacent parts of Iowa and Illinois may not be out of it. A bit early for amounts but a band of wind driven snow looks like a decent bet.

Sinister month

Really?

84 at MLI for a 43 degree swing.

Temp is already up over 30 degrees from the morning low of 34. Going to be a massive final diurnal swing.

Will be interested to see 1) if a band of snow materializes and 2) if IND gets in on it. Indy has only had one 1"+ snow from April 20 on, and it wasn't even in April. 2.4" on May 2, 1897.

NAM looks to be particularly bullish on snow potential.

The bold is something I alluded to on Sunday. When something is modeled that you've rarely or never seen before, it's human nature to have some difficulty in processing that. Another somewhat recent example from outside the region is Hurricane Michael... probably even more of an outlier. Models suggested a very intense hurricane hitting the FL panhandle, but did you (the global you, not you specifically) really think it was going to landfall there as a high end cat 4 (or cat 5 if rumors are true) until it strengthened toward that level? Forecasting is prone to error anyway but outlier events just add another layer of difficulty.

Today's high at ORD was 73. According to my research, this is the first time on record that Chicago has had a 4"+ calendar day snow and a high of 70+ within 2 days before or after. The closest example seems to be April 1967, which did it in opposite fashion to this year with the warmth coming first. 4/21/1967 (an infamous day in northeast IL weather history) had a high of 74 and 4/23/1967 had 3.1" snow.

Really did ride the edge

74 with plenty of sun. Amazing turn from 2 days ago.

A look back at that April 1961 storm: That one had a bigger area of snow. For the city of Chicago/immediate suburbs, the 2 storms appear to be pretty similar. Farther west of the city, the 2019 storm is more impressive.

I think he's just talking about the different shade of color on that image, i.e. more concrete.

One tenth away from that daily mark in 1961. Here's the list for any calendar day in April. Really shows the hostility of climo after the first week of the month. 4/5/1982: 9.4" 4/2/1975: 9.4" 4/6/1938: 9.0" 4/1/1970: 8.2" 4/4/1920: 6.4" 4/16/1961: 5.4" 4/14/2019: 5.3" 4/2/1926: 4.6" 4/8/1938: 4.5" 4/1/1993: 3.7" 4/23/1967: 3.1"

This is the first time on record that Chicago has had back to back Aprils with at least 3" of snow. April 2018: 3.2" April 2019: 4.8"+

Fatties have resumed, but this burst won't last too long. Don't have nearly what you guys to my north/west have but this is still enough to be the most snow I have personally witnessed this late in the season. And the rates rivaled anything that occurred this winter.

Aa someone who was expecting it to stick to pavement/roads, even I'm a bit surprised at the ease to which it accumulated.

Roads are a slushy mess even though it stopped snowing like an hour ago.