379
FXUS63 KMPX 271747
AFDMPX

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Twin Cities/Chanhassen MN
1147 AM CST Thu Nov 27 2025

.KEY MESSAGES...

- Cold and breezy but otherwise quiet today. Happy Thanksgiving!

- Another large scale system will arrive Friday night into Saturday,
with a Winter Storm Watch issued for southern Minnesota where
several inches of snow accumulations are possible.

- Temperatures turn even colder behind the early weekend system,
with highs in the teens and lows in the single digits Sunday and
Monday. Wind chills will drop below zero for both mornings.

&&

.DISCUSSION...
Issued at 254 AM CST Thu Nov 27 2025

A brief pocket of clearing that moved from central to southern
Minnesota over the last few hours is once again filling in with
stratus that doesn`t really look to move all that much today,
resulting in mostly cloudy skies for the holiday. Northwesterly flow
aloft coupled with cold air advection in the low to mid levels will
keep the clouds locked in as surface high pressure will not be
strong enough to overcome the dynamic cooling keeping the clouds
around. Winds will remain breezy at 10-15mph with some gusts up to
around 20mph out of the northwest across the area as temperatures
peak in the mid to upper 20s. A few flakes may squeeze out of the
low cloud deck, however no new snow accumulations are expected today
giving us a break until our next system looks to arrive Friday
evening into Saturday.

Speaking of which, the first half of Friday will be relatively quiet
as our next system is developing over the Rocky Mountains, with
continued cooler temperatures as weak surface high pressure keeps
the colder air locked in and flow aloft remains northwesterly to
westerly. Once we reach sunset and into Friday evening, the first
echoes of what looks to be a fairly long duration snow event move
into southwestern Minnesota as a developing surface low over the 4
corners region begins to strengthen as an upper level trough
negatively tilts coming off the mountains. There is a slight delay
in the movement of the surface low due to the tilting of the trough,
resulting in the low pressure system lingering over the four corners
region into early Saturday before finally beginning to move towards
southeastern Iowa with a trajectory towards southern Lake Michigan
by Sunday morning. There is fantastic agreement for this time scale
on a broad shield of light to moderate snowfall on the northern side
of the surface low which looks to continuously produce snow showers
across the southern half of Minnesota and into western Wisconsin
through all of Saturday before the low pressure system pushes
towards the Great Lakes by sunrise on Sunday. There is still some
wobble within the track of the surface low, however there would be
need to be a significant shift to the south to avoid seeing
accumulating snow as it moves through, especially for southern
Minnesota which will see the best overall chance for significant
snow accumulation. Forecast soundings show a deep DGZ upwards of
10kft in depth with forcing plentiful due to the incoming trough,
falling heights, and proximity to the surface low. Snow ratios will
likely hover in the low teens given the deep DGZ and winds will be
much weaker than the system which moved through yesterday night such
that snow accumulations should be a bit easier to realize without
the blowing and drifting. We have issued a Winter Storm Watch south
of the Minnesota river tonight due to the high likelihood for
accumulating snow, with 6 inches or more possible in portions of
southern Minnesota from midnight Saturday to sunrise Sunday. Given
it is a longer duration even on the order of 24-36 hours, snowfall
rates may not be particularly high at any given time and instead we
rely on the duration of snowfall and the good dynamics within the
DGZ to produce most of the accumulation.

As the system moves out by midday Sunday, surface high pressure
returns alongside northwesterly upper level flow, bringing in
further 10 to 15 below Celsius 850mb temperature anomalies which
will keep cold air locked in place to start December. Forecast
temperatures Sunday morning will be in the single digits with wind
chills in the single digits below zero thanks to relatively weak
winds. Low temperatures Monday morning not even reach the 0 mark for
all but the Twin Cities where the urban `heat` island may keep us
just above 0 as wind chills once again drop towards -10 with winds
remaining fairly weak. Temperatures rebound a bit by the middle of
next week with highs in the mid 20s and lows in the low teens once
again. After the weekend snow, further chances look sparse with a
couple chances for flurries that look unlikely to accumulate towards
the end of next week.

&&

.AVIATION /18Z TAFS THROUGH 18Z FRIDAY/...
Issued at 1145 AM CST Thu Nov 27 2025

Satellite captures a broken deck of MVFR stratus ~2-2.5k feet
over south central MN/western WI. While it may not be a
continuous stretch of MVFR observations, the overall theme will
be for MVFR cigs to stick around into this evening before
lifting from northwest to southeast. Forecast soundings reveal
that the stratus is aligned with the snow-growth layer across
western WI, so can`t rule out a few snowflakes. No impacts are
expected. Northwest winds remain gusty, say between 20-25kts
through the afternoon before diminishing this evening. Westerly
winds will be on the lighter side tomorrow morning prior to a
turn out of the southeast ahead of an incoming weather system
that will bring snow chances heading into the weekend. Should
see mid to high clouds building in towards the end of the TAF
period ahead of the incoming storm system.

KMSP...Upstream obs indicate that MVFR cigs will prevail
through much of the afternoon, though brief breaks in the
stratus are possible. Northwesterly winds decrease this evening
and MVFR cigs look to scatter out.

/OUTLOOK FOR KMSP/
SAT...MVFR/IFR/-SN. Wind NE 5-15kts.
SUN...VFR. Wind NW 10-15kts.
MON...VFR. Wind SW 5-10kts.

&&

.MPX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
MN...Winter Storm Watch from Friday evening through Saturday
     evening for Blue Earth-Brown-Faribault-Freeborn-Martin-
     Nicollet-Redwood-Steele-Waseca-Watonwan.
WI...None.

&&

$$

DISCUSSION...TDH
AVIATION...Strus