textproduct: North Platte

KEY MESSAGES

- Slight chance of light snow across far north central Nebraska after midnight tonight

- Chance of snow late Friday night into Saturday

- Winds increase early Saturday, with strongest winds on Saturday afternoon for all of western and north central Nebraska

- Reinforcing cold air brings much colder temperatures Saturday into early next week

SHORT TERM /THROUGH FRIDAY/

Issued at 443 PM CST Thu Nov 27 2025

The main concern in the short term will be the chance of precipitation tonight. Mid level FGEN band moves in across portions of the northern CWA along with a fairly decent ribbon of moisture. Confidence is moderate that any snowfall that occurs will hold off until after midnight, with the greatest timeframe generally after 6am. This will be fairly quick moving, thus expect accumulations to remain light, with most locations across far northern Nebraska, generally HWY 83 east and north of HWY 2, closer to the SD/NE border will only seeing a dusting as probabilities of seeing a half inch or more is generally 25% or less. The area of greatest moisture and lift is situated across extreme north central Nebraska, generally Boyd and Holt counties, this area has probabilities of 35 to 40 percent of seeing a half inch or more, thus don't expect much in the way of accumulations for Friday morning, but can't rule out a location in Holt or Boyd counties seeing up to an inch. Expect most of the precipitation to be east of the area by early Friday afternoon with a lull in precipitation through the day Friday, most locations will remain mostly dry through 00z.

LONG TERM /FRIDAY NIGHT THROUGH THURSDAY/

Issued at 443 PM CST Thu Nov 27 2025

Attention then turns to the next system moving in Friday night into Saturday. Some models have started to hint as some potential for precipitation further south into southwest Nebraska, however uncertainty remain in how saturated the air in the lowest levels will be. Bufkit soundings do show early on in the transition period, generally the late Friday into early Sat, a little layer of warmer air, generally along I-80 and south, where there could be the potential for some freezing drizzle. However confidence is low as the lowest levels near the sfc on the soundings still show drier air and not a fully saturated sounding, thus have added the mention into the forecast of some patchy freezing drizzle with amounts, less than 0.05, that although not significant could result in slick spots, but again confidence is fairly low in this occurring, but something to keep monitoring with future forecast.

As for the snow potential, an area of upslope across the northwest Sandhills, in the Pine Ridge area, will bring the potential for some snowfall amounts nearing 1.5 to 2 inches, although there could be the potential for higher amounts in the area, confidence is medium that amounts will exceed 3 inches a probabilistic models show less than a 40 percent chance of this occurring. For areas east of this area, generally north of HWY 2, amounts will mostly be under 2 inches for the time period from late Friday through Saturday afternoon, still continue to see isentropic downglide moving in fairly quickly which will bring drier air into the area and keep qpf amounts low. The far north central counties of Holt and Boyd may see slightly higher amounts as drier air may not move into the area, but don't expect amounts to exceed 3 inches as probabilistic models continue to remain consistent in keeping it at a 40 percent chance or less, greater snowfall amounts will be east of the forecast area into north east and eastern Nebraska.

A cold front will move through early Saturday switching winds to the northwest with winds increasing through the day. Strongest winds will be in the afternoon with gust of 35 to 40 mph, however there could be some localized areas that may see wind gusts greater than 40 mph. The combination of winds and any snowfall accumulations in the northern Sandhills and north central Nebraska could lead to some patchy blowing snow and some visibility reductions. The cold front will bring a reinforcing shot of the cold air with low temperatures dropping into the single digits on Saturday and highs on Sunday in the 20s, with another night of mostly single digit lows. Wind chills on both Saturday and Sunday night will reach a few degrees below zero across the northern Sandhills and north central Nebraska.

AVIATION /18Z TAFS THROUGH 18Z FRIDAY/

Issued at 1144 AM CST Thu Nov 27 2025

VFR conditions will prevail through the next 24 hours. Winds through midnight will remain light around 5 to 10 kts, switching from the north northwest to the east southeast this evening. Winds will then begin to increase late tomorrow morning to around 15 kts with gust up to 25 kts. Cigs will also begin to lower tonight into tomorrow with mid level clouds moving in but will still see VFR conditions.

LBF WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

None.