140
FXUS63 KFGF 250029
AFDFGF

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Grand Forks ND
629 PM CST Mon Nov 24 2025

.KEY MESSAGES...

- Falling and blowing snow will lead to impacts during the
  holiday travel period Tuesday, particularly from the southern
  Devils Lake basin, southern Red River Valley, into west-
  central Minnesota.

- Much colder temperatures are expected from Wednesday onward,
  along with several low chances for snow.

&&

.UPDATE...
Issued at 627 PM CST Mon Nov 24 2025

Starting to see some digging of the wave in eastern Montana with
widespread snow evident from observations in northeast Montana.
This low will continue to propagate and slightly dig over the
next several hours towards our area. Ahead of this wave, there
is a large swath of radar returns, however water vapor and
observations confirm that precipitation is struggling to reach
the ground, so saturation initially will be necessary to get
precipitation to the surface. Regardless, impacts to the D evils
Lake Basin are expected to begin a little after midnight,
spreading eastward through the early morning hours.


&&

.DISCUSSION...
Issued at 234 PM CST Mon Nov 24 2025

...Synopsis...

Today is the last day for well above average temperatures in the
foreseeable future, with most locations well into the 40s and
50s, warmest in west-central MN. Conditions become more winter-
like starting late tonight and Tuesday, lasting through the end
of the forecast period early next week. This includes winter
impacts during holiday travel period Tuesday, as well as a
switch to below average temperatures well below freezing. The
Winter Storm Watch has been upgraded  More details can be found
below.

...Winter impacts Tuesday...

A system will move through west to east late tonight through
Tuesday night across North Dakota into Minnesota bringing
falling and blowing snow, including a period of heavy snow rates
and quickly accumulating snow. This will result in travel
impacts within our area Tuesday. Highest impacts are forecast to
be within west-central Minnesota.

There was some uncertainty in how a southern stream shortwave
trough would interact with the incoming northern stream wave
that traverses our area. This is no longer the expectation as
the southern stream wave is well displaced from the northern.
This will effectively allow the northern stream wave to traverse
the area rather progressively west to east across ND into MN.
The southern wave has, however, introduced higher moisture
content for the northern wave to feed off of. This will aid in
feeding strong and focused synoptic forcing within the
deformation zone via TROWAL, again in a progressive nature.
Guidance is also hinting at increasing frontogensis to
collocate itself within the deformation zone/TROWAL,
particularly as it enters into Minnesota. These synoptic and
mesoscale aspects will allow for heavy snow rates to develop in
a rather spatially confined area as the wave traverses west to
east across the region.

Strong pressure gradient will accompany this wave, likely to be
collocated to some degree within the area of heavy
snow/strongest forcing, leading to gusty winds. However, strong
cold air advection with this wave will bypass our area to the
west and south, meaning there isn`t much potential for
`overachieving` wind gusts via momentum transfer. However,
there is the expectation of funneling-effect the Red River
Valley can have given northerly winds, most likely to bring
gusts in the far southern Red River Valley near 40 mph by
Tuesday afternoon. The combination of falling heavy snow and
gusty winds will result in impacts from significantly reduced
visibility.

With increased confidence in the overall track of the wave, consensus
from latest ensemble and high resolution guidance is honing in
on area to experience highest QPF/snow that will drive impacts.
This paints a picture of most notable travel impacts within
southern Devils Lake basin, into the southern Red River Valley,
and into west- central Minnesota. Impacts are forecast to be
relatively higher within west-central Minnesota due to longer
residence time for heavy snow to occur Tuesday afternoon into
evening. Thus, the decision to issue a Winter Storm Warning was
made to account for this area.

There is an expectation of higher potential for impacts to
travel given the expectation of more people traveling occuring
2 days before Thanksgiving holiday, combined with this being
the first widespread and significant snowfall event of the
season.

We are still expecting an influence of compaction/melting to
occur since snow moves through our area during the daytime hours
Tuesday. Most degraded accumulation efficiency impacted by
compaction/melting will occur outside of moderate to heavy snow
rates. This may lead to a scenario were light snow is falling,
but accumulation is not occuring, especially on non-grassy
surfaces. This is most likely to occur generally along and north
of the US Highway 2 corridor, with heavier snow rates able to
compensate for compaction/melting to some degree.

Heavier snow rates greater 0.75 inches per hour will also drive
impacts through reduced visibility to quarter mile, especially
as these rates combine with gusty north winds leading to blowing
snow. Once snow rates diminish, lingering blowing snow impacts
are expected to wane due to relatively warm temperatures and
sustained winds remaining below 30 mph (albeit some gusts around
40 mph are forecast within the southern Red River Valley).

There remains uncertainty revolving around how initially warm
surface temperatures may influence impact potential, especially
as it relates to travel impacts. Should initially wet-slushy
snow melt on contact before freezing with decreasing
temperatures Tuesday night and beyond, this may introduce a
layer of liquid that turns icy on the surface, increasing
impacts toward travel conditions. Areas near central Minnesota
may be most at risk in seeing this outcome given the forecast of
heavier snow rates to move into this area near sunset Tuesday
evening.

...Well below average temperatures, precipitation potential...

All ensemble guidance agree beyond Wednesday will be more
winter-like, with below average temperatures staying below
freezing, and potentially dipping below zero late this week
into the next. There are varying solutions that continue
intermittent waves of light precipitation over the Northern
Plains into Upper Midwest, with a baroclinic zone lingering
nearby. Weak wave traveling along this baroclinic zone may
introduce periodic chances of snow to our area late this week.

Some ensemble guidance still depicts a notable wave ejection
out of the West into the central CONUS late this week into early
next week. Should this occur, additional opportunities for
potential winter impacts would ensue. However, uncertainty
continues even further into this period, particularly in regards
to precipitation potential. Thus predictability and confidence
is too low to comment in more details with respect to winter
impacts.

&&

.AVIATION /00Z TAFS THROUGH 00Z TUESDAY/...
Issued at 510 PM CST Mon Nov 24 2025

Aviation conditions will begin to deteriorate after midnight,
but until then expect generally VFR conditions and light winds.
Ceilings will gradually fall through the evening into the
overnight, eventually becoming MVFR to IFR by 12z. Accompanying
these ceilings will be light to moderate snowfall, eventually
heavy at times although whether TAF sites are impacted has a
lower predictability, impacting visibilities to IFR and LIFR.
The greatest chances for heavy snow and attached LIFR conditions
will be FAR and regions across southeast ND and west-central
MN. Blowing snow will also accompany snowfall as gusts approach
25-40 knots from the north. Depending on how much snow hits the
ground, blowing snow may prolong impacts after falling snow
ends. Flight categories should remain at least MVFR across all
TAF sites by the end of the TAF period with lingering IFR at FAR
and BJI.

&&

.FGF WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
ND...Winter Weather Advisory from midnight tonight to noon CST
     Tuesday for NDZ006-014-015-024-026.
     Winter Weather Advisory from 6 AM to 6 PM CST Tuesday for
     NDZ027>030-038-039-049-052-053.
MN...Winter Weather Advisory from 9 AM Tuesday to midnight CST
     Tuesday night for MNZ001>003-013>017-022-023-027-029-030-
     040.
     Winter Storm Warning from noon Tuesday to midnight CST Tuesday
     night for MNZ024-028-031-032.

&&

$$

UPDATE...Perroux
DISCUSSION...CJ
AVIATION...Perroux