Insider Blog: What may change before this week’s storm arrives

With a winter storm approaching by midweek, the stormtrack weather team has its full attention on tweaking the forecast.

There are three key variables that still play a role in the remaining uncertainty surrounding the storm; track, intensity, and transition time.

First, let's look at the big picture. Our primary disturbance is an upper level low to our southwest. At the same time, a disturbance to the north will advance south east. If these two disturbances can sync up, it may create a stronger storm that would have a more northern track.

If our storm tracks further north, this brings more warmth into mid-Missouri. This would favor less snow, more rain and even freezing rain. A southern track would leave us with more snow.

Storm track will likely have a big impact on onset timing, but we will likely all see a changeover to wintry mix and snow.

Overall timing slates rain for Wednesday evening, changing over to a wintry mix Wednesday night into Thursday morning, but a slow cool down could greatly affect impacts.

If cold air is slow to rush in, road temperatures will take longer to cool below freezing; greatly impacting any wintry precipitation totals.

Overall, confidence is increasing in the forecast, but stay tuned as any of these variables could have a sizeable impact on what we end up with on Thursday.

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