Welcomed Rains Raising Water Levels, Cold Air keeps Coming

As I mentioned yesterday, the widespread rains across the Mississippi & Ohio River Valleys will begin to show up in rising water levels.   It will take some time to work down to us, but if the rain & snow keeps falling, perhaps by mid-late December we'll see water levels back above 8' at the Carrollton gauge.

The top radar view is from this morning with the next being at 4 PM.  River level models have a gradual rise coming for the next 7-10 days.  Note the current dip below 3 feet is caused by the strong northerly winds & low tide.   The other story is the current cold that is not going away.  Why is that?

Lots of early season snow covers a good portion of the northern U.S.  These views are from my son's (Rob) house in Longmont, CO. but can be repeated across the Plains into the Great Lakes.  The snow cover even shows up on Satellite views when skies clear.

In the middle view, you can see the rivers and lakes stand out.  The bottom has extensive clouds covering most of the eastern half of the U.S.  The flow coming out of Canada is bring the chill all the way down to us.  In the sub-tropical jet stream, another disturbance will keep us in clouds through Thursday.

With the cold air pouring over the still warmer Great Lakes, the snow machine is going full blast.  On Hannah's 4 PM program, she had a graphic that gives us some hope warmer air might return by NEXT week.

Since our normal/average highs are still 70+, even next week won't be balmy.  We have reached the time of the year when freezes are possible with the record lows in the high 20s.

November started off way too warm, but we'll quickly even that out the next 7-10 days.

If you're looking for sunshine, it make take a while as extensive cloud cover is lingering,  in addition, new higher clouds are spreading in from the SW.  At the surface, dew points/drier air have push through down into the Gulf.  IF you're dressed for it, the cold doesn't feel bad.  Heck, I walked Bailey wearing an undershirt, a shirt, a sweatshirt and an outer jacket and it felt pretty good even with the winds.  This is as cold as I want it!  Stay tuned all you cold air geeks!