Ag Weather Forum

It is chilly east of the Rockies after a clipper system has pushed some cold air into the country from northern Canada. The cold will continue to spread eastward through Thanksgiving. But there is a bigger concern out there for those traveling during the busy holiday weekend and that will be because of a major winter storm that is forecast to sweep across the country in a couple of pieces.

The first piece to the storm will move into the Canadian Prairies and Montana Thursday night after the dishes have been cleared from Thanksgiving dinner, spreading a band of snow across the Northern Plains and into the Upper Midwest on Black Friday, Nov. 28. The second part of the system will move into the Central and Southern Plains Friday night and push eastward across the rest of the country for Saturday and Sunday, Nov. 29-30. This will cause a messy and confusing precipitation pattern across the country, especially with the preceding cold air.

Models are still working on the details, but a wide band of 6 inches or more is likely from Iowa through Michigan, including southern Wisconsin, northern Illinois and northwestern Indiana. Some models are forecasting amounts closer to a foot across Iowa where the two systems will merge. Heavy snow to the northeast may be enhanced by the Great Lakes, increasing the snowfall potential into the double-digit range as well.

Six inches or more may also fall in the first band from Montana southeast across the Dakotas, but that is likely to be a narrower band of heavy snow, with lower amounts either side of it.

Light to moderate snow will also be possible across eastern Colorado and Nebraska, though the development of this snow may increase or decrease based on how the two systems interact. Farther east, temperatures will be borderline and a mix of rain on the southern edge of the snow may make for a very sharp cutoff across Missouri, southern Illinois, central Indiana and much of Ohio. Small changes in temperature either way could increase or decrease snowfall in these areas. Regardless, air and ground travel should see significant delays for what is the busiest weekend of the year.

Farther south from the Southern Plains through the Southeast, a line or two of scattered showers and thunderstorms are likely to form. The risk of severe weather is low, but not zero, and may include some areas that got hit with heavy thunderstorms earlier this week from eastern Texas and Oklahoma through Tennessee down to New Orleans. Rainfall amounts may exceed an inch for some of these areas as well.

To go along with the precipitation, strong winds are likely to develop. Exact winds will be harder to forecast, but many areas should see gusts in the 30-40 mph range with some areas ahead of the system seeing gusts in the 40-50 mph range from the Mississippi Valley east through the Midwest on Saturday. If strong winds can maintain themselves across the top and behind the storm, blizzard conditions may occur with the snow, at least for a brief period of time. Blowing snow will be a travel hazard as well.

After the system pushes through, a blast of arctic air will follow. Temperatures are forecast to be 10-20 degrees below normal for most of the Plains and Midwest for the first few days of December. Temperatures will likely be colder than that over areas that get heavy snow. That would generally push low temperatures below zero Fahrenheit across the Northern Plains and into the single digits across the Midwest. High temperatures may not break the freezing mark as far south as Kansas and the Ohio Valley after the storm leaves.

To find more weather conditions and your local forecast for free from DTN, head over to https://www.dtnpf.com/….

John Baranick can be reached at john.baranick@dtn.com

(c) Copyright 2025 DTN, LLC. All rights reserved.