Snow likely Friday with more to come Saturday

ROCKFORD, Ill. (WIFR) - After an extremely lackluster start to the snow season, we’ve seen the pattern reverse course a bit in the past few days.

With another 0.9″ officially tallied at the Chicago-Rockford International Airport, our seasonal snowfall total has grown to 11.2″, now sitting less than ten inches below normal. There’s still a way to go to catch up, but the thought here is that we’ll further close the gap, potentially significantly, in the next two days.

While things are to remain quiet the rest of the night, and skies may actually clear a bit, we’ll quickly cloud back over early Friday ahead of an Alberta Clipper system that’s to deliver us a brief, but potentially impactful shot of snow. Snow looks to begin between 6:00 and 8:00 Friday morning, and will last through the midday hour, or very shortly thereafter.

This doesn’t figure to be a major snowfall producer, with most models generating under an inch of accumulation, but that doesn’t mean there’ll be no problems. In fact, there could be some rather significant issues.

The snow’s to be falling during a time in which winds will be reaching speeds of 20 to 25mph. Factor in that it’ll be a dry, fluffy snow, and there’s a real concern about blowing and drifting snow, as well as significantly reduced visibility. Travel WILL be impacted, despite the snowfall amounts being rather low.

Following a quiet Friday afternoon and Friday night, attention then turns to the next storm system that’s to approach Saturday. This stronger system is to spread snow over our area in the mid-morning hours of Saturday, and we’ll see rather continuous snow for an 8 to 10 hour timeframe.

This system, compared to Friday’s, will be almost a complete opposite. Wind won’t be an issue with this storm, so blowing and drifting will not be a concern. However, the lengthy duration of the snowfall will allow for rather substantial accumulations to take place. Our initial thought is that the Saturday storm will bring an additional 2″ to 6″ of snow to the Stateline, bringing the two-day snowfall total to between 3″ and 7″ areawide.

Quieter weather follows Sunday, though the pattern is to turn markedly colder. Expect a steady diet of highs in the teens and 20s, with nighttime lows in the single digits or even below zero for the vast majority of the upcoming week.

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