Winter Storm Bella will continue to bring the first, not to mention locally heavy, accumulating snow of the season for some in the Upper Midwest and Great Lakes Saturday after dumping up to 18 inches of snow in the Missouri Valley Friday.
Winter Weather Alerts
Parts of the Sioux City, South Dakota metro area picked up over a foot of snow in an intense snowband Friday. Snow has since ended, there, but has now spread into the Great Lakes, with some totals over 10 inches already coming in from parts of Wisconsin and northern Illinois.
Winter storm warnings continue from parts of eastern Iowa into northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin, including the Quad Cities, Madison, Rockford, Milwaukee and Chicago.
In the much of the Upper Midwest, this means a likelihood for at least 6 inches of snow in 12 hours, or 8 inches of snow in 24 hours.
Winter weather advisories are posted for much of Lower Michigan and far northern Indiana, including Detroit, Grand Rapids and Lansing, where somewhat lower snowfall totals are expected.
Snowfall Reports
A sampling of snowfall totals since Thursday.
Despite lacking strong surface low pressure, these systems are notorious heavy snow generators in the Midwest.
Snowfall Totals So Far
As of Saturday morning, numerous locations from southeastern South Dakota to southern Wisconsin and northern Illinois have reported a foot or more of snow from the storm.
Here is a sampling of official snowfall totals around the area, by state:
- South Dakota: Tea (18 inches), Sioux Falls Regional Airport (7.2 inches)
- Iowa: George (17 inches), Waterloo (12.7 inches), Dubuque (10.2 inches), Des Moines (6.9 inches)
- Nebraska: Near Bloomfield (16 inches), South Sioux City (6.5 inches), Valentine (4 inches)
- Minnesota: Worthington (8 inches)
- Illinois: Capron (14.6 inches), Rockford (7.3 inches), Moline (5.6 inches), Chicago O’Hare (5.4 inches)
- Wisconsin: Near Footville (17 inches), Monroe (16 inches), Milwaukee (2.8 inches), Madison (2.7 inches)
- Michigan: Bloomingdale (4 inches), Benton Harbor (3.3 inches), Lansing (2 inches)
Bella also produced the season’s first flakes as far south as northwest Arkansas Saturday morning, and left a dusting of snow in Springfield, Missouri, as well.
Winter Storm Bella Snow Forecast
Snowfall Forecast
Additional snowfall forecast to fall on top of what is already on the ground.
The relative lack of moisture and quick-moving nature of Winter Storm Bella should mitigate this from becoming a crippling storm for many.
However, a swath of moderate to heavy snow is still expected Saturday from southern Wisconsin and northern Illinois to Michigan. Where smaller-scale, more intense snowbands temporarily set up, snowfall rates from 1-2 inches per hour are possible, for a time.
Latest Winter Weather Radar
Areas of snow show up in shades of blue. Possible frozen precipitation (sleet, freezing rain) shows up in pink. Rain shows up in shades of green, with heavier rain showing up in yellow, orange and red shadings.
Saturday’s heaviest additional snow will be from the northwest Indiana suburbs of Chicago to the “thumb” of Lower Michigan, with 6 inches or a bit more of snow possible in that swath, including South Bend, Indiana, Lansing, Flint, and the northern suburbs of Detroit.
Surface low pressure is expected to strengthen a bit once it reaches the Great Lakes. The pressure gradient between this developing low and high pressure building in the Rockies and High Plains will produce increasing winds in the snow area Saturday, leading to some reduced visibilities in blowing snow, and some minor drifting, but we are not anticipating blizzard conditions with Winter Storm Bella.
Once the surface low wraps up in eastern Canada, some bands of lake-effect snow are possible off Lakes Ontario and Erie, and a little wrap-around snow may blanket the Allegheny Plateau, Appalachians, Adirondacks and high country of northern New England.
Given this first snow of the season in some of these areas may be locally heavy, slow down, leave extra time if you must travel, or consider postponing your trip.
Flight delays and cancellations have already been reported at Chicago-O’Hare Airport, and are possible out of smaller regional airports, as well. Check your flight status before leaving for the airport.
Winter Storm Bella Snow Timing
Saturday
Saturday’s Forecast
Blue areas indicate areas of forecast snow, pink indicates either rain or snow, and green indicates rain.
Snow continues in northern Illinois and southern to eastern Wisconsin, spreading and intensifying in much of Lower Michigan and northern Indiana.
Snow will end by midday in eastern Iowa and northern Missouri. Some blowing and minor drifting snow is possible across portions of Iowa.
Any rain may change to snow in northern Ohio, northwestern Pennsylvania and western New York Saturday night.
Increasing winds Saturday night may produce areas of reduced visibility in Michigan, and all the Great Lake snowbelts with the exception of the Lake Ontario snowbelt.
Season’s first accumulating snow cities:
- Saturday: Chicago, Grand Rapids, South Bend, Detroit
- Saturday night: Erie, Pennsylvania
This fresh snowcover, clearing skies and lighter winds sets the stage for a cold Sunday morning in the Bella snow area.
Sunday
Sunday’s Forecast
Blue areas indicate areas of forecast snow, pink indicates either rain or snow, and green indicates rain.
Lake-effect snow will linger in the Great Lakes snowbelts, south of Buffalo, New York, and north of Syracuse toward Oswego, New York, and the Tug Hill Plateau.
A few snow showers are possible across northern New England, although moisture appears to be relatively limited.
Gusty winds may persist around the eastern Great Lakes and New England.
A few flakes may even fly across the central Appalachians from West Virginia into interior Pennsylvania, though little to no accumulation is anticipated.
Check back with us at weather.com and The Weather Channel for updates and the latest forecast of Winter Storm Bella.
November Heavy Snow: It’s Been Awhile For Some
Despite the Upper Midwest’s snowy reputation, heavy snow in November outside the Great Lakes snowbelts isn’t as common as you might think.
According to National Weather Service data, Chicago hasn’t seen a November with 6 inches or more of snow since 1978, much less 6 inches of snow in one November storm.
Average November snow in the Windy City is only 1.4 inches, just under 4 percent of their average seasonal snow. Their average date of the season’s first 1 inch-plus snow is December 7.
Last season, it took the Windy City until January 5 to accumulate a season total of 6 inches, which they may do so with Bella here in late November. In fact, their first 6-inch-plus snow event of last season was Winter Storm Linus just before Groundhog Day.
Similarly, Milwaukee hasn’t seen a 6-inch-plus November snow total in 20 years. In terms of snowfall so early in the season, Milwaukee has only recorded four 2-day snowfall totals of greater than 6 inches before Nov. 22, dating back to the late 1800s.
Five of the past nine Novembers in the Brew City haven’t even produced one-half inch of snow, total.
Across the lake, however, Grand Rapids, Michigan, has had a break so far this November, lacking measurable snow prior to this weekend system. November 2014 was their record snowiest November, with 31 inches of snow during the month.
Also of interest is the tendency for less snowy seasons during strong El Niños, which we are currently in.
In five previous strong El Niño seasons (1997-98, 1982-83, 1972-73, 1965-66, 1957-58), Chicago has picked up an average of only 23 inches of seasonal snow, which is 15.4 inches below the 1950-2015 average of 38.4 inches.
Jonathan Erdman is a senior meteorologist at weather.com and has been an incurable weather geek since a tornado narrowly missed his childhood home in Wisconsin at age 7. Follow him on Twitter and Google Plus.
Ah, can’t beat winters in Texas. It’s the summers that make up for no winter to speak of in TX. Rather be hot than cold any day.
Ya know, back when I was a kid, snow was fun. Today, it’s an annoyance. Oh, yes, I have fond memories of sledding days but they have long since past. Now, it’s just cold, colder than a witch’s whatever, but, never you mind, I’ll just throw another log on the fire.
haha That’s what Digger did Millard. 🙂 😎
We had a bad wind storm in norther Idaho Tuesday We lost power until last night.
It was good that the power outage was no compounded by a snow storm.
So far it has been a mild winter here.
So now they are naming every snow storm that comes along, same as hurricanes? Someone tell Gore his numbers still are fraudulent though, but if they start naming every storm they’ll run out of names within a few years. I guess we can then start using spanish and muslim names for awhile.