StormTracker 8: Quiet weather today & Tuesday; Winter Storm Wednesday & Thursday

RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) - We will see sunny to mostly sunny skies across Central Virginia today and it will remain windy. Our high temperatures will climb into the middle 40s but when you factor in that wind it will feel more like the middle to upper 30s this afternoon.

Clear skies will be with us tonight and it will be cold, but those winds will diminish which is good news, however, our overnight lows will fall back into the middle 20s.

Tuesday will be another decent day in terms of seeing partly sunny skies however it will remain cool for this time of year with highs in the middle 40s.

The much-advertised winter storm will be affecting us Wednesday and Thursday and right now here's what we're looking at:

Snow will develop early Wednesday morning and pick up in intensity across all of Virginia. The snow will be steady to heavy at times as we go into Wednesday afternoon, Wednesday evening and Wednesday night. The snow will taper off by early Thursday morning and partly sunny skies will return to the region in the afternoon.

Now there are some significant changes to the weather models this morning and two of those changes go hand in hand. The system is tracking a little bit farther south this morning which lessens the risk of seeing sleet mixing in across Central Virginia however it does bring in colder air which increases the snow ratio. The snow ratio is the amount of moisture equivalent to produce snowfall.

In a typical storm you would be looking at something like 10 to 1 meaning it takes one inch of rain to produce 10 inches of snow; in a very wet heavy snow you might have something like six to one or eight to one meaning it takes one inch of rain to produce 6 in or 8 in of snow. In this case, being colder, this is looking more like a 15 to 1 ratio meaning it will take 1 inch of liquid equivalent to produce 15 in of snow. That is a lighter fluffier snow. However, the other part of that with the system tracking southward beginning late yesterday and continuing into the overnight the models have significantly cut back on the amount of available moisture for us. Yesterday and Saturday, we were looking at the potential for 1” to 1.25” of liquid we are now looking at the potential of maybe a 1/2” to ¾” of liquid.

What does all this mean? Right now, I think most of Metro Richmond could be good for 6” to 9” inches of snow while areas along US Highway 58 to the Tidewater could be more in the jackpot of snowfall to receive 9” to 12” of snow. Areas to the northwest of Ashland, north to Fredericksburg and out to Charlottesville could see 3” to 6” inches of snow.
Now this is a significant change compared to some of the discussions that we have had over the weekend. But this is what the current set of weather models are showing and will have to watch to see if this trend continues.

Thursday afternoon the sunshine will make a return, and it will be a chilly day with highs near 35.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday will feature mostly sunny skies with highs ranging from the upper 30s on Friday into the middle 40s by Sunday.