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Back-to-back storms will dump snow in the West and Central US, then move East later in the week bringing freezing rain and damaging winds, while severe weather and tornado threats stretch from the South to the Northeast.
The Western US will see below-average temperatures this week, while warmer air will remain in the East, creating what forecasters are calling “the great divide,” Fox reported.
Below-average temperatures will move west to east
Arctic air will move from Canada into the West on Tuesday and Wednesday, moving into the central US on Thursday, and moving over the South and Ohio Valley by Friday.
Above-average temperatures will prompt severe weather
The Eastern US will see above-average temperatures on Tuesday, and that will spell trouble from midweek into Friday as thunderstorms will kick up on Wednesday and continue through the end of the week.
A pair of back-to-back winter storms will dump snow across the Rockies, into the plains and upper Midwest earlier in the week, and will bring snow and freezing rain over the Great Lakes and into parts of the Northeast by Thursday, according to the forecast from National Weather Service (NWS).
On Tuesday, parts of North and South Dakota and Western Minnesota were under a blizzard warning by the NWS, while a large swath of the West was under winter storm warnings and winter weather advisories.
Wind alerts also stretched from California to Michigan over parts of the West, Southwest, southern Plains, South, mid-South, Ohio Valley, and upper Midwest.
The second storm will move in late Tuesday. Parts of New Mexico, Colorado, and Kansas could see between 5-8 inches Wednesday through Friday, Fox Weather reported.
Tuesday through Thursday, an outbreak of severe weather is possible over the South and Ohio Valley as back-to-back storms move from West to East.
On Tuesday, the threat of severe weather will be limited to parts of Kansas, Nebraska, and Missouri, Fox Weather reported.
The Storm Prediction Center (SPC) has issued a Level 2 Severe Weather Risk for Wednesday over parts of eastern Texas, southeastern Oklahoma, central and northern Louisiana, Arkansas, Western and Northern Mississippi, Western Tennessee, southeastern Missouri, and Southwestern Kentucky.
On Thursday, the severe weather risk will stretch from the Gulf to the Great Lakes, with the SPC issuing a Level 2 Severe Weather Risk over parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, the Florida Panhandle, Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York.
