textproduct: La Crosse

KEY MESSAGES

- Cooler to start the weekend, with rebounding temperatures Sunday and unseasonably warm for much of next week. Highs Monday and Tuesday surge well into the 40s!

- A nearly dry forecast through early next week with low confidence (10-20%) in the occurrence of any precip for the middle to latter part of next week.

DISCUSSION

Issued at 135 PM CST Fri Feb 6 2026

Tonight - Saturday: Cold Start to the Weekend

Cold air advection is ongoing early this afternoon on a 10-20G20-30kt NNW wind and continues through the evening with winds lessening as a 1035-mb high pressure cell approaches from Manitoba. Clearing skies tonight in most locales, coupled with this polar air, light winds, and snow pack should cause temperatures to tumble into the single digits above/below zero, coldest along and north of I-90 in Wisconsin. However, some solutions hint at clouds lingering north of Highway 29 and temperatures may be tempered under these clouds. The surface high pressure cell passes through Saturday morning with southeasterly winds and WAA increasing during the afternoon. However, highs will still only manage to reach the low to mid-20s, the coldest highs we see for the next week.

Saturday Night - Sunday: Passing Shot of Snow

Mid-tropospheric isentropic ascent increases Saturday night ahead of a 700-mb wave dropping southeastward along the eastern flank of our upstream ridge. A transient fgen banner within this ascent slides along and northeast of the I-94 corridor. Coupled with the drier lower tropospheric profiles, the intensity and spatial footprint of any snow that does make it to the surface will be limited. Therefore, impacts will be minimal with snow amounts of 1/2" or less before the forcing departs later in the night.

Monday - Tuesday: Warm!

A broad shortwave ridge expands eastward for the start of next week with solid surge of warm air advection (+10-12C at 900-850 mb) working N/NE from the Central and High Plains. Exactly far north the warm front/airmass advances on Monday hinges on cloud cover and the influence of our current snow pack, but the ensemble distributions are strongly clustered in the upper 30s to mid-40s with some of the upper 10th percentile solutions pushing highs into the upper 40s to low 50s in northeast Iowa and southwest Wisconsin. A cold front sweeps through on Tuesday and likely will result in some non-diurnal aspect to temperatures, but where and how much is not known.

Mid to Late Week: Above Average Temps, Maybe some Precip?

A zonal to southwesterly flow pattern remains in place through the end of the week, assuring us that at or above average temperatures (30s for highs) remain in place until next weekend. Questions at this point in the forecast mainly revolve around subtleties in any waves that propagate through the flow and how a cutoff low off the California behaves towards the end of the week. There are still a few (<5%) ensemble members that show an appreciable winter storm towards the end of the week, but these are the far end of the ensemble distribution and nearly 50% of the members have little to no precipitation.

Looking ahead to next weekend and even early next week, there is a signal in the longer range ensembles of even warmer weather, but much can change at this range in the forecast.

AVIATION /00Z TAFS THROUGH 00Z SUNDAY/

Issued at 528 PM CST Fri Feb 6 2026

VFR conditions are expected throughout the TAF period with mostly clear skies. Winds will continue to lessen after sunset with winds around 8-12 kts diminishing to around 5 kts or less into the overnight. Skies will remain mostly clear for Saturday with only a few to sct high clouds expected later into the afternoon.

ARX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

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