Another snow bust in Dodge City. I am now in KC with the family for Christmas…and more??! Well, the southern elongated PV anomaly in the mid levels I talked about in the previous posts actually developed into a decent, but small closed low, instead, but farther south…and moved straight east after it closed off over New Mexico. As of 1:00am CST on Christmas Eve morning, the storm center was over West Texas with an impressive precipitation area across West Texas into Southwest Oklahoma. This area, denoted in yellow in the image below, is the area to watch for the Kansas City metro tomorrow into tomorrow night for heavy snow. Yes, the 00z models had backed off a little bit, however, the satellite and radar presentation across West Texas is impressive, and this is the beginning of the cyclogenesis event for tomorrow and tomorrow night as this storm tracks across the Ozarks and then eventually into the midwest states. There will be a period of Freezing Rain in the KC metro as the arctic air filters into the area first at the surface. Eventually, though, the entire column will be below zero, probably sometime in the 4-7pm time frame in the KC area. Then after that, periods of heavy snow should occur during the evening into overnight hours, which is also when the winds will really kick in.
