Details on Possible Winter Weather

A cold front is currently working through the area, but the rush of arctic cold air is a little ways behind the front. Winds will be on the breezy side later tonight causing for some very cold wind chills (maybe feeling more like the mid teens°). Clouds will hang around today and we might see a few iso'd rain showers this afternoon. Later tonight some of this rain activity might switch over to wintry precipitation.

***A HARD FREEZE WARNING is in effect from 10 PM - 11 AM for northern portions of the WAFB viewing area.***

Very cold temperatures are expected overnight into early Friday.

Freeze durations could be 12-15 hours overnight Thursday into Friday. Friday morning will be very cold with mornings temperatures in the mid 20°s. Because temperatures will be 26° or lower for about 6 hours, a Hard Freeze Warning is in effect for northern portions of the WAFB viewing area. Areas south of Ascension and Iberville Parishes are under a Freeze Warning.

***A WINTER WEATHER ADVISORY is in effect from 6 PM - 6 AM for western portions of the WAFB viewing area.***

Wintry mix possible especially west of Baton Rouge

 
Keep this in mind, activity will not be widespread and will be contained mostly to areas West of Baton Rouge. Accumulation on roadways is not expected, but we may see some slick spots on bridges and overpasses. Any accumulation will be light, less than an inch mainly on grassy surfaces.

Here's a timeline of what to expect:

Afternoon - 10 PM: Iso'd Rain Showers

10PM - 12 AM: Iso'd Wintry Mix (Mainly Sleet and Ice; No accumulation)

12 AM - 6 AM: Sct'd Wintry Mix (Mainly snow flurries and sleet; very small accumulations

 

We still don't have "complete" agreement from our weather models as to exactly what to expect.  Our in-house weather model PrecisionCast illustrates a farther east reaching stretch of wintry precip.

 

Notice though that activity is still very iso'd to sct'd in nature.  Also PrecisionCast indicates a very brief time period for wintry precip here in metro Baton Rouge.  Overnight being the main possible timeframe for some combination of snow, sleet, and ice pellets.

 

The North American Model or NAM is indicating less of an Eastern stretch of wintry precip.

 

The NAM keeps all of it's winter precip west of metro Baton Rouge.  It too keeps a brief window of time for this activity to occur, but unlike PrecisionCast the NAM puts a chance for wintry precip into the mid morning hours of Friday.

 

Weather model winter precipitation accumulation totals have ranged from none at all to 0.2".  While 0.2" could be viewed as significant for us here in South Louisiana, the bottom line is that the brief overnight period for winter precip and the lack of significant accumulation should mean this won't be much of an issue for us to handle.  Again the main area to see iso'd to sct'd wintry mix will be metro Baton Rouge and areas west.  Surrounding areas will see most likely nothing more than a few flurries or sleet pellets with no accumulation.