There’s a lot of snow and cold air headed for the Intermountain West and Plains in the run up to Thanksgiving. In fact tomorrow looks nasty if your travelling the high road routes over the Cascades, Sawtooth, Bitterroots etc as wind and heavy snow combined may produce blizzard conditions. Last year saw a cold and snowy Thanksgiving for the Northeast but this year looks quite different, perhaps record warm for some in the Ohio Valley and Northeast.

The reason for a warm Thanksgiving east of the Mississippi this year is thanks to the strong El Nino driving a big positive over the Northern Plains and south-central Canada while an active southern branch storm track slides underneath. The PNA is negative, the NAO positive hence the trough hanging back West and ridge in the East.

This afternoon’s visible satellite loop clearly shows the upper low spinning out of the Gulf of Alaska and down the West Coast pulling Arctic air with it.

Snow amounts so far.

GFS 500mb height anomaly for Thanksgiving.

2m temperature anomaly at 18z Thanksgiving.

2m temperature at 18z Thanksgiving.

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Here’s the weather map as we head towards Thanksgiving.

GFS surface shows the plunge of arctic air into Montana and Wyoming while the storm dives into the Texas Panhandle with snow and ice on the cold side, flooding rain on the warm side.

This could be a big snow maker for the Oklahoma and Texas Panhandles.

Within the next 5 days, 8-10 inches of rain is possible, likely presenting Dallas, TX with it’s wettest year on record.

Back during the weekend, Chicago got hit by it’s second biggest November snowstorm on record (11.2in) followed by a tie for the coldest November temperature in 29 years but the upcoming Thanksgiving looks to be the warmest in 3 years.

Lows Sunday AM dipped to 7 degrees at O’Hare which ties the lowest November reading set last year. You have to go back to 1986 to find a colder November night in Chicago.

See tonight’s video for the discussion.

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Tags: Thanksgiving 2015, Thanksgiving snowstorm, Thanksgiving weather