Good Monday Morning bloggers,
The morning rush hour began with a very wet commute. Some of the rain was heavy and rainfall amounts are approaching 1 inch already.
This rain came at just the right time as we just had a very windy and dry stretch with the high fire danger day after day.
This storm is the first in a series of storm systems that will impact the next couple of weeks.
With the time change, this picture was taken at around 7:15 a.m., when it was still dark. The rain was falling pretty heavily at this time, so my dogs, Sunny and Rainbow, had their morning outside time cut to around a minute.
They just ate breakfast, and I will have to get them out again later this morning.
There was an area of snow north and west of KC this morning. This snow will miss us, but there is actually a chance of snow around Friday night or Saturday that we are monitoring closely.
There is also a intermediate storm system that may bring some rain around Wednesday, which is the day the Big 12 Basketball Championships begin downtown.
The best day this week for enjoying the fan experience appears to be Thursday when temperatures may jump into the 60s.
By the way, we reached 72 degrees Sunday downtown and it was our first 70-degree day at KCI Airport since October 18, or 142 days below 70 degrees.
I have had a few questions about whether people can put out their potted plants yet? No! It is way too early and there are a few freezes, and likely a hard freeze or two ahead of us and some possibility of that snow.
So, practice patience on thinking spring has started and is here for good. There will be a battle between spring and winter in the coming weeks with winter winning a few of these battles.
More on March Weather Madness:
There is a cold front moving our way today, and it will arrive by around 5 p.m. with a big temperature drop. It will warm up ahead of the front today with more rain.
The chance for rain will go down this evening as the colder air takes over.
Then, we will begin anticipating this next fascinating weather set up:
Look at this map above, which shows the unusual set up.
I say unusual, because my own meteorological eyes look at this and it takes me a few minutes to digest what we see here. There is a wet pattern with the Gulf of Mexico open for moisture supply, and there is a cold air mass in place.
The colder air is trying to be overrun by warmer air, so any snow mixed with the rain may be just that — snow mixing but not accumulating.
If the colder air is just a bit stronger later this week, then it could be all snow. We will monitor for that, but there is something else.
Take a look farther north, and there is an Arctic air mass trying to come down.
That is below-zero air not that far away and in the U.S.
So, as I am suggesting, March Weather Madness has started with the high winds, fire danger, this morning's rain, a cold front tonight, then more storm systems, possible snow and more rain.
This is what we have to look forward to.
Our spring weather special will air at 6:30 p.m. on March 19.
We will have our spring and summer forecast that evening along with a recap of last year's crazy May 28 tornado day.
Have a great start to the week. We will go over all of this with KC's Most Accurate forecast as we go in-depth on 41 Action News today and tonight!
Gary
