United States

Quite a Contrast From West to East

April 29, 2013; 3:09 PM ET

A typical, wacky spring weather pattern shaping up when you look at the jet stream pattern this week which will eventually feature a closed upper-low over the U.S. Midwest and a blocking high over eastern Canada.

Cold will dominate across the Prairies during the middle of the week while the East will enjoy May-like temperatures through the end of the week.

The image below shows the GFS ensemble model projected temperature anomalies (degrees F) for North America on Wednesday.

Southern Prairie snow.....

In the meantime, a narrow band of snow will shift eastward from southern Alberta to extreme southwestern Manitoba tonight then across the rest of southern Manitoba on Tuesday.

In general, expect about 2-8 cm of snow with this feature and that includes the Regina, Sask., region later tonight into Tuesday morning. Rain will change to wet snow in the Brandon, Man., area Tuesday morning then taper off by the end of the day. Due to the timing of the snow, most of the roads will just be wet, but there can be a small slushy accumulation on grass. Winnipeg will get a mix of rain and wet snow starting around noon Tuesday then become mostly wet snow. Wet snow will taper off by the evening with less than 3 cm on grass, while roads are just wet.

I do not see any significant spell of warm weather for the southern Prairies any time soon. Temperature will be below to occasionally near-normal through May 10. The only good news is that I do not see any major rainfall events either, so river flooding should remain in the minor to moderate zone for most areas from southern Saskatchewan through Manitoba.

Warmer and drier in the east

A strengthening upper-level high over eastern Canada this week will block the storm forming over the Midwest U.S. from tracking east anytime soon, so it looks like temperatures, much of this week and perhaps next week will be well above normal with below-normal rainfall.

The exception will be coastal areas of Atlantic Canada, which will stay near normal. We also have to watch for some back-door cold fronts moving down from the Maritimes into eastern New England late this week and next as that is very common this time of year.

Latest look at the snow cover.....

Below are the latest snow cover charts for the Prairies and parts of eastern Canada.

The light blue colors indicates thin snow or ice coverage, while the darker blue/purple show deeper snow pack.

Recent warm weather has really taken a toll on the snow pack across the southern Prairies and now there is hardly anything left to melt around upstream waters of the Red River along the Dakotas, which is good news.

Greener vegetation spreading northward

Spring is back on schedule across the eastern U.S. and you can clearly see the evidence of spring on this recent MODIS high resolution satellite image.

Note the greener look to the bottom quarter of the image as the trees across the Middle Atlantic now have leaves.

Farther north, the browns still dominate as the trees are just starting to bud or flower. Soon enough, the entire region will be mostly green.

The views expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of AccuWeather, Inc. or AccuWeather.com