November warm surge driving record low snow cover

It's been a Jekyll and Hyde November.

November started on frigid Decemberish notes across the USA. The 5-day temperature departure shows most of the USA was feeling below average temperatures in the days leading up to November 11th.

Minnesota's "light switch" November

Temperatures ran a good 8 degrees colder than average the first 12 days of the month across Minnesota. Then the weather switch suddenly flipped. Our late month warm surge is on the verge of pushing November's overall average monthly temperature into warmer than average territory. You can see the dramatic blue to red flip of the temperature switch this month at the end of this 2017 temperature departure plot for MSP Airport.

In search of snow

Our recent warm spell has many Minnesotans searching for snow. You'll have to travel to far northeast Minnesota to get some decent snow cover now. That's a significant shift from much more extensive snow cover just two weeks ago.

Way below climatology

Our current snow cover across Minnesota is well below longer term averages. A check of the Rutgers Global Snow Lab climatology chart shows in more than 50% of years, snow cover is common down to the Iowa border in late November.

Record low snow cover across USA

Just 8.5% of the lower 48 states have snow on the ground. That's a record low for this date in November since monitoring began in 2003. Jason Samenow at The Washington Post's Capital Weather Gang has a nice write up on the national snow cover numbers.

No snow in sight, yet

The short-term prospects for adding snow cover don't look good. Above average warmth holds the rest of this week across much of the USA.

In fact, most of the Arctic Circle is warmer than average this week. The only real extensive pocket of bitterly cold air lies in wait over Siberia.

There are signs a chunk of that cold may make a move on the USA next week.

Stay tuned.