Mother Nature’s giving us the cold shoulder

Wind chill advisories blanket the upper Midwest this morning and the cold modifies only slightly this afternoon.  The apparent temperature will still feel well below zero this afternoon.

Yesterday afternoon, Sioux Falls, S.D., received 2 inches of snow and now has some snow cover.  More than 3 inches of snow accumulated at Des Moines, Iowa, last evening.

Are some of you longing for a scene like this?  Or perhaps just to see some bare ground?

Here's the truth of the matter; we have more cold to deal with as we enter into the meteorological spring!

The silver lining, and this is perhaps a stretch, is the increasing amount of daylight.  There is some sense of warmth to the afternoon sun.  Certainly not offsetting the biting wind.  Speaking of biting wind, there will be gusty winds on Wednesday that sting despite the increase in temperature on the thermometer.

There could be a couple of inches of fluffy snow in northeast Minnesota, particularly the Arrowhead region, on Wednesday as a reinforcing blast of arctic air invades Minnesota.

Temperatures just before sunrise today were sub-zero.  Some Minnesota readings at 7 a.m  included 26 below zero at Fosston and Longville, 12 below at Duluth, 9 below at St. Cloud and 6 below in Austin.

The wind chill at 7 a.m.  in Sauk Centre in central Minnesota was 30 below zero, with an air temperature of 14 below zero.

Last week the North Central River Center released their spring snow melt flood early.  It hasn't received much attention simply due to the fact we are likely not to see a melt soon.

Steve Buan with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's North Central River Forecast Center seems it up this way, "too early to call."   A rapid snow melt towards the end of March with additional rainfall changes the outlook in a big way.  Of course we always have to pay close attention to the conditions in the Red River Valley.

There is significant water in the deep snow pack.  One observer reported more than 5 inches of water equivalent in northeast Minnesota in a post on Facebook on Monday.

Cooperative observers will be augmenting this gamma radiation estimate of water content as we move through the snow melt process. For more on the work of the National Operational Hydrologic Remote Sensing Center stationed in Chanhassen you can explorer their website.

We are on track in the Twin Cities to move up the standings with days of sub-zero this winter.  The streak of sub-zero days is expected to extend to Monday.

Have an activity planned for Saturday to celebrate the first day of the meteorological spring?  It will be very cold.

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The cold air expands west on Monday.  Here's the early morning temperature forecast from NOAA's Global Forecast System  model for the nation at 6 a.m. on March 3.