[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CiX77ohn3ME&w=640&h=480]
ONE NICE DAY: Saturday will be the best of the weekend across the state with mostly to partly sunny skies. Highs today in the 20s to lower 30s. Perhaps 40s in southwest Iowa as warm air moves in from the southwest.
ICING ON THE GROUND: Late tonight into Sunday will get quite messy across the area with some snow, sleet and freezing rain moving in from the southwest with the next storm system. The precipitation may start out as snow and sleet mix in the northern and eastern counties towards dawn while the southern and western counties may just have freezing rain and sleet changing to freezing rain by sunrise. Temperatures will be well below freezing in many areas, but with warm air moving over the cold surface temperatures at and near the ground, that’s the recipe for some freezing rain and sleet across the area. This will continue into Sunday as well with Freezing rain possible across most of the state during the morning hours before changing over to rain mainly along and south of Interstate 80. The northern counties may see freezing rain all day or a slow switchover to just rain later in the day. Amounts of icing will vary, but the best estimate now is between a tenth and a quarter inch of ice across the state. Advisories and Warnings are likely to be hoisted for this system later today so stay tuned for the latest on this system over the next 24-48 hours.
VERY WARM THEN VERY COLD: The warm weather continues into the upcoming work week, but it is January after all and January like temperatures have to make an appearance again sooner or later and they do with a cold front sweeping across the state late Tuesday into early Wednesday. Rain will break out Tuesday afternoon as everyone will be well into the upper 30s and 40s. This may changeover to brief period of snow early Wednesday morning as cold air filters in. Readings Wednesday will be dropping throughout the day into the single digits above and below zero by Thursday morning. Highs the rest of the week will be in the teens to lower 20s with dry conditions.
LOOKING AHEAD: The GFS has been showing some warmer weather as we head into February, but with very few storms of any significance. We’ll have to wait until this weekend storm gets out of the way before we can focus on anything farther out that may affect us later on.