United States

Where's the Cold? Another Storm?

December 05, 2012; 6:36 PM

Core of the cold hanging out from Alaska to the Yukon Territory

Clearly, the core of the Arctic air has been sitting over parts of Alaska and the Yukon Territory since the beginning of November, with some pieces getting down into the Prairies.

The image below shows the average temperature departures in degrees C (multiply by 1.8 to get F) since Nov. 1. Dawson, YT, has averaged a whopping 12 C colder than normal.

Also, the average temperature in the town of Northway, Alaska, so far this month has been 41 below zero C or 42 below zero F!

Unfortunately, there are no immediate signs of a break from this very cold pattern across that region, and as long as it stays unusually cold across Alaska it will have a hard time getting persistently cold across the Northeast U.S. and eastern Canada.

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Additional snow for southern BC mountains

Another in a series of storms will bring more snow to the mountains of southern BC Wednesday night into Thursday.

While this storm will be much weaker than previous storms, it will be a colder storm, so snow levels will be quite low. The snow should be nice and fluffy for the mid and higher ski slopes along the Coastal Mountains.

The overall pattern for BC does not look as stormy through next week, but it's not going to be dry either as I see two additional shots for decent snow across ski country into the middle of next week.

Whistler/Blackcomb ski resort encased in snow

So far this season, there has been 351 cm or 11.5 feet of snow at the resort (5,400-foot level) with a current base of 180 cm or 71 inches.

I saw this Youtube video released from Whistler/Blackcomb showing the incredible conditions on the mountains.

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Computer models are coming a little more in line with a potential storm for this weekend and early next week, though there is still much uncertainty at this point.

The graphic below is our first track forecast for the upcoming storm that will move out of the Rockies and toward Ontario.

At this point, based on this early track forecast, it looks like the best potential for at least a moderate accumulation of snow will run from Colorado to Wisconsin then into parts of Ontario and Quebec, but likely staying north of Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal. Quebec City will be close. Even if this track verifies, there still could be a period of steady snow or mixed precipitation Sunday night or Monday just north of Toronto and then into the St. Lawrence Valley before a change to rain.

Ski country north of Montreal might do well in terms of snow from this storm.

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