As advertised here throughout the past week, we’ve seen one of the strongest arctic high’s in some 10 to 20 years drive southeast from Alaska and is now shivering the Midwest and East in temperatures more suited to mid-January with temperatures from northeast Mexico all the way to southeast Canada in the 20-35 below normal range.

As well as the coldest start since the early 90s for most, some parts will not have seen this type of cold start, this early, since the 1970s. As well as the bitter chill, we’re also talking heavy snow widely across north and west Texas into New Mexico and even down into Mexico.

Here was the scene before sunrise in Amarillo this morning. A very wintry scene for sure along I-27.

Check out this other traffic cam out of El Paso above all places!

It’s not just Texas but Oklahoma as well as back over New Mexico.

Check out Sandia Peak above Albuquerque, NM earlier today.

While a lot of US focus and attention is on the southern snow, let’s not forget the MASSIVE 3+ft snows occurring around the London, Ontario area all thanks to a narrow but intense and persistent lake band. This kicked off yesterday, really cranked overnight and continues today.

Check out this shot from last night via The Weather Network.

After bringing 4-8, locally 12+ inches of snow to parts of Mexico, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, the impressive winterstorm (for any time of year, never mind November) will progress east running the southern flank of the arctic high. Don’t be surprised if you live in the Southeast to see ‘surprise snow’ over parts of northern Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and perhaps the mountains of Georgia and the Carolinas before it runs up the coast.

Here’s the ECMWF surface chart for later today and note the big high centred over the Mid-Mississippi Valley the with the storm system along it’s southern edge bringing snow, sleet and freezing rain across the Southern Plains.

That same system is projected to intensify early and mid week, potentially bringing a big rain, sleet and snow event to the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast around Thanksgiving.

So How Cold Was It This Morning?

While it was the coldest of the season so far up and down the I-95 corridor, it was even more impressive back west with many spots not seeing as cold of a start, this early, since the 1990s.

The coldest air this morning was centred over northern Ontario where temperatures by dawn this morning were widely in the -20 to -30C range but there were pockets of -35 to -40C (-40F) which is pretty rare for this early. Down along the shore of Lake Ontario and there was cold records to be had including Toronto with a low of at least 10F or -12.5C. That is in fact the first record low in some 8 years at the Pearson Airport site.

Temperatures early this morning across the Northeast and Southeast Canada. Note the 10 in Toronto.

South of the border and there was widespread teens, even single digits over the Midwest and Ohio Valley with the coldest start of the year so far along the East Coast. Tonight will be the coldest for them.

In terms of just how rare this cold is, I have seen a few reports but many more will likely come in later today and tomorrow. Here are a few… Rockford, IL hit 9 which was the coldest since 1997 while Chicago’s 12 was the coldest since 1995. It got down to 4 in northwest Illinois.

It was impressively cold in both Kansas City and St Louis which hit 12 and 15 respectively while surrounding suburbs dropped into the single digits. There is likely to see countless records and interesting stats which show this was the coldest start this early in some 15 to 30 years.

Here are the lows from this morning.

Check out the wild rise and fall in temperatures across the US as of this afternoon.

With the cold, dense and rare strength of this arctic high firmly established across the eastern two thirds, there is little warming even through this afternoon.

Here’s the mid afternoon view of Manhattan from Newark, NJ.

Check out these 12pm CT/1pm ET readings.

Here are the departures from normal for today’s highs..

Tonight could be equally as impressive as this afternoon’s temperatures. Like in the Midwest this morning, tonight could well be the coldest for November in some 15-20 years from Richmond up to Boston.

Projected lows according to TWC. Could be colder than this with teens possible in NYC, Philly, even DC.

There will be another very cold day tomorrow with highs again struggling to get out of the 20s even in the big cities.

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Thanksgiving Snowstorm?

There remains a good deal of uncertainty regarding the Thanksgiving week storm and it’s all in the timing and merging together of a southern and northern storm system over the Mid-Atlantic by Tuesday-Wednesday.

Here’s the latest charts showing the evolution through the upcoming week.

By Tuesday or 48 hrs from now we can start to see the low and it’s precipitation gather intensity as cold air is left in it’s wake over Texas, look out for possibly the coldest night on the TX/OK Panhandles, especially with some snow cover.

48 hrs

By 72 hrs the low is gathering steam as it lifts up the East Coast, pushing a lot of moisture up with it. Heavy rains could bring flooding to parts of LA, MS, AL and GA with even some backside snow in placves. As the low pushes north we have a low crossing eastern Canada and likely bringing snow to parts of Ontario and Quebec but it’s playing a key role in what type of precipitation we’ll see over the US East as it pulls in the next wave of arctic air.

72 hrs

By 96 hrs there’s a pretty elongated sub-995mb low pushing up the coast with enough cold air along it’s western flank and over the Appalachians for heavy snow but further east and along the I-95 corridor, it’s likely to be rain, then sleet and finally some snow once the low exits and hammers Canada.

It will turn VERY cold yet again once skies clear out, throughout the East Coast.

96 hrs

As for snowfall, here’s the latest ECMWF snow chart through 120 hrs. Quite the dumping along the spine of the Appalachians from West Virginia/western Virginia up through Pennsylvania into New England. Snow is likely on the backside of the low for a time in the Big Cities, perhaps a coating to 2 inches when all’s said and done.

Yes, Thanksgiving will likely look at feel more like Christmas this year for many!

CPC 6-10 day temps, brrr.

Beyond next week and the pattern supports more cold.. Here’s the CFSv2 temp anomalies through the next 4 weeks.

wk 1-2

wk 3-4

Model consistently shows strong cold building over Canada and dropping it into the Eastern US week 3or the first 10 days of Dec.

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Tags: record cold, Thanksgiving snowstorm, Thanksgiving weather, US Arctic Blast