textproduct: La Crosse

KEY MESSAGES

- A multi-day period of intermittent snow begins Thursday afternoon and lasts through the weekend. it remains difficult to pin down the exact timing at a given location.

- Overall snow amounts look light, 1-3 inches over the 1-2 day span, with travel impacts likely driven more by increasing winds on Friday.

- Temperatures plummet for the weekend with lows falling to the single digits below zero for Saturday night through at least Monday night. Morning wind chills fall to between -10 and -20.

DISCUSSION

Issued at 145 PM CST Wed Jan 14 2026

Rest of Today - Thursday Morning: Seasonable and Dry

A 1032-mb surface high pressure cell over the eastern Dakotas migrates eastward and over the region tonight. The pressure gradient and surface winds relax with its approach with the only aspect of the forecast in question is whether any lake-effect induced clouds stream south from Lake Superior across central and southwestern Wisconsin overnight. Shallow cloud thicknesses coupled with increasing heights do not lend strong confidence to this cloud shield holding together. Skies have been trending clearer than the models showed earlier and we could see temperatures in the favored bog areas tank below zero if trends hold.

Thursday Afternoon - Friday Morning: First Round of Light Snow

Longwave ridging amplifying into an Omega Block along the West Coast will force a PV lobe to drop SSE from northwestern Canada and settle over the north-central CONUS as the eastern post of this block. The end result will be a prolonged period of light snow that lasts for several days. Intra- and inter- model consistency over the last few days with the timing and amounts of snow have been less than desired, but not unexpected, given the transient nature of the mesoscale forcing that will drive any higher snow rates.

Latest trends in the 12Z HREF/RRFS members have been for the onset of the light snow to be earlier Thursday afternoon, but accumulation amounts look to be light (0.5-1") through the evening given the weaker frontogenesis forcing. As kinematic forcing increases with the approaching PV lobe, snow rates look to increase slightly later in the night and then taper off Friday morning once the low passes to the northeast. Either way you slice the forecast, snow amounts only look to be around 1-2" by Friday morning.

With the loss of moisture and ice introduction, there is a short window for freezing drizzle during the afternoon and evening hours on Thursday. This looks transient in nature and confidence in the freezing drizzle even occurring is around 20-30%. Did add it in to the forecast for a short window Thursday evening, but as with the snow forecast, this is subject to continued change.

Several CAMs do show steepening low level lapse rates following a region of small mesoscale fgen/snow band from southeast MN into NE Iowa Thursday evening with the potential for wind gusts of 30-40 mph. Will have to watch trends in the guidance to see if this solution continues to show up in future runs.

Friday Afternoon - Night: Blustery with Blowing Snow Risk

Friday morning may see a lull in the snow before the cold front arrives in the afternoon. A favorable show shower/blowing snow environment follows in the wake of the cold front, though whether we see conditions reach "snow squall" levels west of the Mississippi is less certain given the lack of an organized forcing mechanism outside of the cold front. The steep low lapse rates, >0 J/kg SBCAPE, and gusty winds of 25-35 kts should be in play. The question revolves around the strength of the HCR- ish snow showers. The risk of a flash freeze also looks to be low since surface temperatures should remain below freezing (only a 10% chance of seeing above freezing temps ahead of the cold front). Roads could still warm above freezing from any incoming solar insolation, so cannot fully rule out some melting/refreezing.

Saturday - Sunday: Pesky Light Snow Showers Could Linger

The blustery winds and scattered snow showers persist through Friday night and into Saturday, though snow amounts and impacts look to be low. The medium range solutions still are not completely sold on the structure of a secondary trough that dips down on Sunday, which will play into whether we see another round of light snow during the day.

Cold Weekend/Early Next Week

The aforementioned cold front heralds a stark transition back to wintertime temperatures for at least the start of next week. Highs on Friday will be reached during the morning/midday with falling temperatures during the afternoon. Temperatures fall 20-25 degrees Friday afternoon/evening and struggle to rise out of the single digits to low teens on Saturday. Exactly how low temperatures fall will be dependent on cloud cover, especially Saturday night as the surface ridge passes. Roughly 10-20 percent of the NBM ensemble members have low temperatures of -10 to -20 for Sunday morning, a plausible scenario given the fresh snowfall and clearing skies. A similar setup could play out Monday night behind a clipper system.

AVIATION /18Z TAFS THROUGH 18Z THURSDAY/

Issued at 1133 AM CST Wed Jan 14 2026

VFR conditions for most are expected through the TAF period with the exception of some MVFR CIGS in portions of west central Wisconsin, near the I-94 corridor, this evening. Breezy northwest winds sustained at 15 to 25 mph with gusts of 25 to 35 mph continue through mid afternoon before gradually diminishing into the later afternoon/early evening. Winds shifts to the southwest between 12 and 16Z across the region. Light snow begins to move into southeast Minnesota and western Wisconsin later Thursday morning. CIGS on Thursday morning lower throughout the morning and by the end of the TAF period are sitting between 3000 and 5000ft.

ARX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

WI...None. MN...None. IA...None.