Snow, diving temps follow thundery downpours here
The notoriously volatile weather of March is on full display as the new month opens. Chicagoans can expect a jarring and very windy transition from Thursday’s occasionally thundery downpours to the wind-whipped snowfall expected to sweep into the area amid falling temperatures Thursday night into Friday. Any bursts of heavy rainfall have little choice but to run-off into ice-clogged rivers Thursday or stand in puddles. Area soils are frozen after a February that finished 10th coldest since 1871, averaging nearly 10° below the long term 137-year average. Frozen soil blocks percolation of moisture into the soil and the snowmelt brought on by Thursday’s milder than normal temps only complicates matters by contributing to run-off.
The atmospheric set-up becomes ripe for powerful wind gusts and falling temps Thursday night. Accumulating snow is likely to blow and drift Thursday night and Friday.
--By Tom Skilling, WGN-TV Chief Meteorologist