Area Forecast Discussion
Issued by NWS North Platte, NE

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FXUS63 KLBF 122026
AFDLBF

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service North Platte NE
326 PM CDT Tue Mar 12 2024

.KEY MESSAGES...

- Snow chances Wed. night into Thu.

- Strong winds Thursday

- Potential for moderate rainfall Wed. through Thu.

&&

.SHORT TERM /THROUGH WEDNESDAY/...
Issued at 255 PM CDT Tue Mar 12 2024

Most current visible satellite shows most of the
remaining snowpack has melted across the area. Although there will
be low level moisture around tonight from the melting snowpack,
winds overnight will stay up around 5 to 10 mph and should hinder
any valley fog from forming overnight.

As for temperatures on Wednesday, as the upper level trof pushes
east, slightly cooler air behind it will infiltrate western
Nebraska. Highs across western Nebraska will only be in the upper
40s to low 50s. Temperatures across north central Nebraska into
southwest Nebraska will remain warmer ahead of the trof with
temperatures reaching the upper 50s to low 60s.

Precipitation will start to spread into the Sandhills Wednesday
morning into early afternoon. Precipitation will continue to
increase through the afternoon, and will be in the form of all
rain. There may also be the potential for an embedded
thunderstorm across portions of southwest Nebraska into north
central Nebraska, at this time do not expect any severe weather
with storms that develop, however could see some heavier
rainfall amounts within embedded thunderstorms. Through the day
on Wednesday could see qpf values of a tenth or more, generally
west of HWY 83.
&&

.LONG TERM /WEDNESDAY NIGHT THROUGH MONDAY/...
Issued at 255 PM CDT Tue Mar 12 2024

In the long term the main concern will be moderate rainfall and
snow potential Wednesday night through Thursday.

The greatest amount of precipitation with this system will come
during the Wednesday evening and overnight hours, where there
is the possibility of up to half in inch of qpf, with the
greatest potential generally east of HWY 83. Temperatures will
cool overnight and there is the potential for the transition to
snow.

The NAM is the outlier model at the moment and is producing a
pretty significant FGEN band to the north of I-80, generally in
the south central Sandhills. It extends from western Nebraska
into portions of north central Nebraska. However, there are a
couple of competing factors that would hinder the transition to
snowfall, especially east of HWY 83. For areas east of HWY 83,
temperatures are going to be on the warmer side,
probabilisticallyat this moment the likelihood of temperatures
less than 35 degrees is less than 10 percent. This continues to
lead to lower confidence in snowfall east of HWY 83, and the
more likely hood of it remaining all wind, however that being
said, since there is the possibility of an FGEN band developing
we will need to continue to monitor as this could rapidly change
if temperatures are just a couple degrees cooler than
anticipated, then accumulating snowfall and possibly significant
snowfall within the FGEN band may be possible.

As for snow potential for areas along and west of HWY 83, there is a
little better chance, especially the farther west you go,
generally HWY 61 and west of seeing snowfall. The limiting
factor across the west is also the temperatures. Unlike the
system end of last week where snow fell in the overnight, this
system will be fighting daytime heating, where temperatures
during the daytime still look to remain above 35 degrees. Very
few models at this time are suggesting daytime temps lower then
this and probabilistically there is around a 20% chance of
daytime temps less than 35 degrees along and west of HWY 83, but
west of HWY 61 there is a 30 to 35 percent chance or more that
temperatures may be colder than 35 degrees. So at this time the
most likely scenario is that changeover to snow will happen in
the overnight hours across western Nebraska, but would expect a
rain/snow mix in the morning to all rain for any areas east of
HWY 83. Lingering snow in the morning will still be possible for
areas west of HWY 83, before changing back to rain. Rain will
continue through the day Thursday, before tapering in the
evening hours.


Winds will also be strong on Thursday, with wind gust already around
35 mph by Thursday morning. Bufkit soundings continue to show strong
winds in the lower levels, winds between 900 and 800mb are around 30
to 40 kts and won`t take much mixing to bring down the strong winds.
Winds will be very impactful Thursday, especially in the morning
hours when the potential for lingering snowfall exist. Could see
significant reductions in visibility for any areas that has
snow falling. This will be another thing that will continued to
be monitored with future forecast.

Temperatures turn mild for the first part of the weekend with
highs in the 50s Saturday, before a shot of colder air clips the
northern portion of the CWA, cooling temperatures into the upper
30s to low 40s for Sunday. This is just a glancing blow of
colder air and will be short lived, with highs returning to the
mid 60s by Tuesday.


&&

.AVIATION /18Z TAFS THROUGH 18Z WEDNESDAY/...
Issued at 1230 PM CDT Tue Mar 12 2024

For the remainder of this afternoon and tonight, expect mainly
clear skies with a few to scattered high clouds around 25000 FT
AGL. Cloud cover will thicken Wednesday morning with broken
ceilings around 9000 FT AGL after 15z.

&&

.LBF WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
None.

&&

$$

SHORT TERM...Gomez
LONG TERM...Gomez
AVIATION...Buttler


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