New Years weather

Happy New Years Day! Take a look at the surface map I drew below:

(click to enlarge)

There is a cold front pushing through the region, and by 6:00 PM, it will have pushed off into southeastern Missouri. But as you can see, the winds really dont change direction much until after the front has pushed through, and the temperatures behind the front are almost as warm as they are out ahead of it. This not a strong front. It is just a weak pacific front associated with another Clipper system near the Canadian border.

Out ahead of the front, the winds are blowing between 10 and 20 mph, but they will diminish down to 5 mph after the front passes through. Highs today will be in the low to upper 40's and lows tonight will be in the low to upper 20's.

See the stationary front towards western Kansas? That will evolve into a warm front and work its way eastward. Highs tomorrow will be in the upper 40's in northern Missouri to the mid 50's in southern Missouri.

If the warm air can really get its act together, and surge in, we could be in the 50's again Saturday, but it will depend on the timing of a significant cold front. There will be a little disturbence moving through area, and with the warm front in place, drizzle and rain showers will be the result. The cold front will push through sometime late Saturday afternoon or Saturday night, and could cause the rain and drizzle to change over to a few snowflakes.

After that, the low 30's and upper 20's settle in, with a maybe a chance of snow around Tuesday. I will have an update tomorrow, and I will post my top five weather events of 2008 later tonight.

Alex Pickman