More Viewer Photos...

In Miller, South Dakota, we've seen reports of near 13" of snow.

These are a few photos from a viewer in Miller/Hand County.


You can click on any of those images to get a larger view. Looks like some rough conditions in those parts!

~KDLT Meteorologist Aaron Shaffer

Viewer Photos From The Storm!

We've been getting some good viewer pictures from this storm as it starts to wind down - and some pretty nasty stuff has fallen. We've gotten a report of about 16.5" in Corsica - just to the southwest of Mitchell. Mitchell itself didn't miss out either - with about 12.5" of snow.

Things were certainly interesting in other places as well - as we got some pictures from Andover & near the Missouri River.

That was Andover... but this below is near the Missouri River.

We're still looking for more & you can send them to weather@kdlt.com if you have them!

Drive safely!

~KDLT Meteorologist Aaron Shaffer

Travel is Ugly!

Many areas of South Dakota are experiencing a blizzard at the present time so I would urge people to do as little traveling today as absolutely necessary. In some cases, you cant travel as I-90 is closed from Mitchell to Rapid City until further notice and I-29 is closed from Brookings to the North Dakota border. Here is a look at the state travel map.For more travel information go to safetravelusa.com

~KDLT Meteorologist Cody Matz

Storm Update... And Some Cool Viewer Pics

We're seeing some rain showers - and possibly a clap of thunder or two - as we wait for snow to move in to the Sioux Falls area and the rest of SE South Dakota and into NW Iowa and SW Minnesota.

This is the latest radar image as of 10:08pm:

If you've heard any claps of thunder don't hesitate to email us at weather@kdlt.com and we'll mention it - or you can just write a comment on the bottom of this post.

Here are those viewer pictures though - they seem to have been from right before the blizzard conditions.

This is some ice that has piled up by Lake Poinsett sent in from a viewer. Apparently the ice has piled up on the west side of the lake so much that it's about 20 feet tall! This viewer's grandson climbed to the top of the pile.

Another couple of pictures from from Pierre where Zach sent us pictures of sleet. He also says they picked up 6" as of the publishing of this post so far.

You can see the sleet piling up out there - and with cold temperatures and 6" of snow (not to mention 30mph sustained winds as of this 10pm show) I'm sure conditions are pretty bad - so keep that in mind if you're doing any traveling.

Send in any pictures you might have to weather@kdlt.com & we'll put yours up to!

~KDLT Meteorologist Aaron Shaffer

Read Post Below This - But This Is Interesting Too

So... if you're a regular blog-viewer, you've probably taken part in our various polls we like to do every week. We had one on March 10th during a blizzard asking when you thought the last blizzard would take place.

Since that poll we've had 2 more blizzards!

Wild Weather Again...

Things have been pretty interesting so far today - as we've watched blizzard reports coming in toward the North and the West - with fun clouds to watch over Sioux Falls and beyond. Things will change eventually and we're going to talk about that in this blog post, starting with a video of those "fun" clouds we saw as a 1-hour timelapse from our KDLT Skycam:

We've been seeing some nasty webcam shots toward the West already - as snow continues to creep toward the East. It should be a rough night and day for a lot of people out there... this is what it looks like in the Sturgis-area:

This is what we're looking for, as of now, for storm-total snowfall totals. Keep in mind that this map should include snow that has already fallen in some portions of our area:

What we're watching for is a heavy band of snow to move from the West farther east. We're already seeing a heavier band starting to pick up steam - and as that cruises farther toward the East we'll be looking for some heavy totals at times - even in the "per-hour" range. We could pick up a quick 1-2" in those areas just over the span of an hour or so. Some of those heavier areas could see that type of snowfall continue for a few hours, se if you find yourself under the heavier forecasted totals keep that in mind. Most accumulations will occur in a short time span, with lighter snow surrounding. Once again it seems like Sioux Falls will miss out with close to 3" of snow. We are close to that 4-7" range just to the West, though, so if you're a snow-lover you can still hope.

Be careful out there!

~KDLT Meteorologist Aaron Shaffer

Here it Comes!

The snow already beginning to fly across western and northern South Dakota at this hour and that is just going to be intensifying and expanding eastward over the next 24 hours. Here is a current surface map showing where the snow is currently being observed.There is also some concern over the track of this low simply because the snow line where the snow cutsoff is going to be very narrow. For example, Del Rapids could end up with a foot of snow while Sioux Falls only gets 3 inches. It could literally come down to that. Plus, im seeing a few differences between what the models are predicting and whats actually happening. For example, if you look at the picture below, I have cirlced the low pressure to indicate where it is located at the time of this post and where the models said it would be. Notice that it is similar but the actual event could end up being stronger because the low is very closed off meaning the circulation is very tight; that typically shows signs of a very healthy storm system.

What could happen then is if the low is stronger then anticipated, it may dig more south and east causing areas around Sioux Falls to get a lot more snow then what is forecasted right now. So keep watching KDLT so we can keep you updated on the very latest.

~KDLT Meteorologist Cody Matz

Current Situation...

This is where the low is now... you can see a bunch of **** in the area I circled in blue - that denotes heavy snow... and it's moving this way. You can also see all the wind barbs just to our south in Nebraska - that's just the start to the windy conditions we'll see and since those are from the south - they are bringing up the moisture that is going to curl around that low and produce those impressive snow totals. We'll see how things turn out.

~JR

Super Strong Spring Storm

Well this storm is incredibly tricky to forecast with temperatures fluctuating between above and below freezing. Right now it looks like there will be two strong waves of snow, the first being in the NW section of the state, this will occur tonight and into Monday. When temps rise up above freezing we'll see a mix of rain and snow and sleet, making conditions super sloppy. You can see there is a gap between 12+" snow accumulation - that's the area that could see 12+ inches of snow, but most likely won't as the system will be producing more of a rain/snow mix so they won't see just snow thus not as much accumulation. The more snow on the Eastern half of the state will come from the intensification of the low pressure system. It will be a product of long lasting wrap around snow Monday night through Tuesday evening.

So right now we are in the region where the black arrow are... this is ahead of the low, also the reason we are seeing some rain right now due to the southerly winds bringing up the moisture. That moisture wraps around the low pressure because winds circle counter-clockwise around a low. When the moisture catches up to cooler air being brought down from the north, that's when we get "wrap around snow". And since this system will intensify as it slowly moves over our region, we're going to see a whole lot of it in Eastern SD, producing snow totals close to what you saw earlier.

Cody and Aaron will keep you posted as this storm progresses - hope you didn't put away your snow boots!
~KDLT Meteorologist Jesse Ritka

Calm Before The Storm

Things are slightly warmer than they have been over the past few days - temperatures are creeping up to average and we've seen a little more sunshine. We'll go through a major change soon, tomorrow clouds will increase and the chance for rain and snow increases as a new low pressure system slowly crawls in. Here's a timeline for what's expected over the next few days.
And this system will take it's time to head out of here... slowly exiting by Tuesday afternoon. Like Aaron said - this storm looks pretty impressive... and this model is still holding onto the potential for a foot of snow in some places... that tan area along the ND-SD border is supposed to be 18-20 inches... the blues are 8-12 inches... the greens are 4-6 inches... it's really not looking good for areas that are already experiencing flooding problems. This is going to be a very wet snow and I'm thinking that a lot of slush will be on the ground since it's had some time to thaw already this year.

~KDLT Meteorologist Jesse Ritka

Large Storm Looming

We mentioned it recently, and we're going to talk more about it now, but we have quite a storm coming our way. You could call it a "doozy" of a storm, as we did on our 6pm newscast Friday (or at least a "semi-doozy" was about as far as I'd go this far out from the actual arrival of the storm).

Here's the latest out of that system, as per the computer models. Typically we disregard them a bit more at this stage, as you might know if you are a regular reader of our weather blog - but the main 3 computer models we typically analyze are showing agreement much earlier with each other than they would usually show.

As such, here are some totals we could be looking at for early next week - PLEASE don't bet the farm on these totals, because it is very premature. Think of it as a preview of what *could* be rather than what *will* be:

Click on that image to really appreciate it for all it's worth, but remember it is still about 4 days out and there are still other storms circulating that could and likely will affect how much moisture actually gets pulled into that system - along with how much warmth.

We'll be keeping a close eye on this one!

Stay tuned!

~KDLT Meteorologist Aaron Shaffer

Short Weekend Warmup!

I don't want to get too down and crazy about the next system that's headed our way since we need a little good news in the weather department right now. Temperatures are expected to climb their way back to around normal by Sunday with a return of the southerly winds!

We won't be getting the 60s and 70s we saw a few weeks ago, but 40s and 50s will certainly feel quite welcome by Sunday. If you like those for temperatures, make sure you get outside this weekend and enjoy it... it's not going to last past Sunday evening. We're forecasting another disturbance to pass across our region early Monday morning which will bring even more problems to the current flooding situation. I'm sure Aaron will clue you in some more on that storm, or else I'll update you more this weekend.

~KDLT Meteorologist Jesse Ritka

Light At The End Of The Tunnel?

Well, Cody showed you a first glance at that bigger storm headed our way toward the start of next week. It looks like it will be nasty again for a couple of days, at least. With all of this cold weather, you might be wondering when we'll actually get some "real" warmth.


Check out that slide above - this is from our shows tonight, and gives away what I'm about to show you. Basically - we have a dip in the jetstream that is allowing very chilly air to move in over us. What we want is a bubble, or "ridge," in the jetstream that will allow warmer air to move in. There is nothing like that in today's computer models until April 5-6 - but look at this map below:

These are surface temperatures forecasted for Sunday the 5th of April. Not exactly jaw-dropping temperatures warmth-wise - but look at how much better it gets one day later:

Now we're getting somewhere! High temperatures for Tuesday the 7th could end up close to 60s. We'll have to keep an eye on that - but for now that is FAR, far away. Things could easily change by then - and perhaps even change for the better. We'll have to see, but for now at least that gives us some hope as we experience these highs about 15-20 degrees below average.

Have a great night!

~KDLT Meteorologist Aaron Shaffer

Next Week

A quick post today. A preview for early next week as a storm looks to impact the state. Here is what we are expecting for precipitation from this storm. These show the progression of the system over the course of about 36 hours. Most of this looks like its going to be snow. Sorry, I said the snow word but, its becoming more and more of a reality.~KDLT Meteorologist Cody Matz

Cooler Weather Returns

Temperatures will be returning to the thirties over the next few days as a serious of systems will continue to drag cold air down from Canada and keep temperatures below average through the early part of next week. Here are a series of images for surface winds and temperatures at noon Today, tomorrow, and Friday.Notice the persistent northerly wind that will continue to usher in cool Canadian air over the next three days. Now, looks like there might be a brief warm up on Sunday. But then another system Monday and Tuesday could bring rain and snow to the area and would again keep us cool.

~KDLT Meteorologist Cody Matz

Storm Update: When Will It End? Timelapse Of Snow In Sioux Falls

We've seen some impressive snow totals of close to 20-40 inches in the western portion of South Dakota. In our viewing area we saw blizzard reports from all of our westernmost counties in the viewing area - including in the city of Pierre. Everyone was reporting 1/4 mile visibility or less as of late morning/early afternoon.

The good news is that things are starting to come to an end.

This was a radar image from about 6:15pm from the Aberdeen radar. You can see the snow has really become more of a banded situation and is not quite as widespread as we saw when the storm was out west.

That whole mess is moving toward the East and Northeast. We're going to be watching it - but for now if you live where it is not snowing a couple of quick and moderate snow showers are not out of the question between now and the early portion of the overnight hours of Wednesday. This is what we're still looking for - but keep in mind that this map started out at about 1pm, so subtract any snow you've already seen:

You can see 1-2 inches seems to be the trend as far as additional NE snowfall is concerned. In Sioux Falls we can likely expect a couple more snow showers - but generally just a dusting is what we're looking for overnight.

Have a great night and we'll update you as we get new information! If you have any good storm pictures (snow or severe) send them to weather@kdlt.com and we'll put them on-air and on the weather blog.

We'll leave you with this timelapse video of the snow coming through Sioux Falls Tuesday afternoon.

~KDLT Meteorologist Aaron Shaffer

Flooding Underway

We have seen a lot of rain and snow over the past couple of days so flooding now is a big concern and it is already occurring in many areas. Here is a map of the rainfall that we saw on the first round of storms Sunday night.

This map really doesn't do some areas justice because I talked to some folks in the Lake Preston area and their rain gauges had anywhere from 3-5 inches of rain. So there were definitely some local areas that got more then this shows.

Now the big problem with this rain is that much of it is falling on frozen or partially frozen ground. Water doesn't penetrate frozen soil so it just runs off into tributaries, A.K.A. rivers, lakes, and streams. The map below shows the 8" solid temperatures for South Dakota. Notice how many of them across the north are still frozen.Finally, here is a map of the current stages of several rivers across South Dakota. The colors of each dot represent different stages of flooding; Yellow=Near flood stage, Orange=Minor flooding, Red=Moderate flooding, Magenta=Major Flooding. This hopefully gives you an idea of the extent of some of the flooding and how the recent precipitation is just going to add to the problem.

~KDLT Meteorologist Cody Matz

Severe Weather Update With Video

Well, it's been quite a day. It's hard to really tell you too much about the storm if you missed it - but we did capture some AMAZING footage using our KDLT skycam. This is as the storm approaches and passes over.

We got another timelapse then immediately after the storm passed over our station showing mammatus clouds on the tail-end of the line of thunderstorms.

Hopefully you stayed safe and enjoyed the storms. We'll update you more on our blizzard situation out west tomorrow, and for now we'll just continue following any storms.

Have a great evening!

~KDLT Meteorologist Aaron Shaffer

Severe Weather Season Starts Early

Even though there is no official start or end to the severe weather season in South Dakota, it seems like it is starting early this year because its only March and we are having to deal with it. Since we show the Storm Prediction Center's (SPC) outlook for severe weather a lot on TV, I thought I would go into a little more depth on what it means exactly. There are three specific things that the SPC looks for; hail greater then 1" in diameter, winds stronger then 58 mph, and tornadoes. When they combine all of those aspects into one single probability, they get either a slight, moderate, or high risk. Well, the SPC outlooks are a little more detailed then what we show on air so I will go through those now. They (SPC) separates the classifications of severe weather out into three parts; the hail, high winds, and tornadoes. Below is the probability of seeing all three of them starting with hail, then wind, then tornadoes.These pictures depict the probability of seeing this type of severe weather within 25 miles of a point. For example, if you live in Sioux Falls and you stand on your driveway, there is a 30% chance that there will be at least one severe hail event within 25 miles of you.

Meanwhile, on the western side of the state, they will be dealing with blizzard conditions and measuring the snow in feet as portions of the black hills could get 40 inches of snow. If you are planning on traveling west river sometime before Thursday, I would consider just waiting until daybreak Thursday because it is pretty likely that roads will be closed later on tonight because of snow and blowing snow.

~KDLT Meteorologist Cody Matz

Flash Flood Issued Until 11:30pm

Here is the official statement from the Weather Service:

...FLASH FLOOD WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT FOR NORTHWESTERN BROOKINGS...
EASTERN KINGSBURY...NORTHWESTERN LAKE AND NORTHEASTERN MINER COUNTIES UNTIL 1130 PM
AT 1007 PM CDT...NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE DOPPLER RADAR INDICATED THUNDERSTORMS
WITH VERY HEAVY RAINFALL ACROSS THE WARNED AREA.
DOPPLER RADAR ESTIMATED 3 TO 5 INCHES OF RAINFALL THIS EVENING FROM HIGHWAY 14
BETWEEN ARLINGTON AND LAKE PRESTON...SOUTHWEST TOWARD OLDHAM AND INTO THE
FAR NORTHEAST CORNER OF MINER COUNTY.
SLOW MOVING THUNDERSTORMS ARE PRODUCING VERY HEAVY RAINFALL IN THE WARNED AREA.
RUNOFF FROM THIS EXCESSIVE RAINFALL WILL CAUSE FLASH FLOODING TO OCCUR.
SOME LOCATIONS THAT WILL EXPERIENCE FLOODING INCLUDE...ARLINGTON...HETLAND...
LAKE PRESTON...LAKE THOMPSON STATE RECREATION AREA AND OLDHAM.
PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...
BE ESPECIALLY CAUTIOUS AT NIGHT WHEN IT IS HARDER TO RECOGNIZE THE DANGERS OF
FLOODING. IF FLOODING IS OBSERVED...ACT QUICKLY. DO NOT ENTER THE WATER.
TURN AROUND AND MOVE UP TO HIGHER GROUND. D
O NOT STAY IN AREAS SUBJECT TO FLOODING WHEN WATER BEGINS RISING.
DO NOT DRIVE YOUR VEHICLE INTO AREAS WHERE THE WATER COVERS THE ROADWAY.
THE WATER DEPTH MAY BE TOO GREAT TO ALLOW YOUR CAR TO CROSS SAFELY. 

And that picture also shows how much weather will be moving through over the next 48-60 hours. It makes me jealous that there are 2 forecasters for each Weather Service office - just to give you an idea - we've got 5 NWS offices forecasting for different counties in the KDLT viewing area... so that's 10 meteorologists forecasting for different sections in our area... makes it kinda rough on Cody, Aaron and myself, especially when we've got Blizzard Warnings on one half of the state and Severe Thunderstorm Warnings on the other... it's a lot to deal with! But hey - makes the day interesting.

Cody and Aaron will keep you updated on the severe weather potential for Monday and the blizzard/wintry weather as well.

Keep safe!
~KDLT Meteorologist Jesse Ritka

Severe Weather...

Hanson, Hutchinson and McCook counties are all under a severe thunderstorm warning right now... we're watching this second wave on the first round of storms somewhat redevelop right now... You can really tell how much upward motion this storm has from the satellite picture... a very pronounced "circle" just above and to the NW of where the storms are actually occuring. This could mean nickel size hail as well as some damaging winds... more updates later.

~KDLT Meteorologist Jesse Ritka

Severe Weather Already?

We've been talking about it for awhile now, but this is the "Day 2 Outlook" put out by the SPC (Storm Prediction Center) so there is a slight possibility for some large hail, strong and damaging winds as well as the slight chance for an isolated tornado or two. And since we really haven't touched much on severe weather just yet... I'll give you a few clues on a few things we look for when it comes to determining where the severe weather could occur.

The first parameter I'll touch on is CAPE - or Convective Available Potential Energy. Basically how much energy is there that could produce a convective (or stormy) environment. If you want to know more about CAPE, hit this link.

Alright, this one depicts Helicity - basically how wind speed and direction change with height. Values higher than 400 mean there is potential for a rotating updraft - a necessity in tornadoes. For more details on Helicity, check out this website.As Cody Matz mentioned earlier this week, dew points and a good "moisture tongue" are important to aid in severe weather. If there isn't enough moisture in the atmosphere, there will be no chance for any storm development at all, you can refer to his post below for a bit more in depth explanation.

And another thing we check is CIN - Convective Inhibition. The more positive this value is the more stable the atmosphere is... if the atmosphere is stable... not much will happen. CIN values less than 50 are weak and favorable for severe weather while higher values point towards stable conditions. More information can be found here.

So that's a quick glimpse of a few things we look at when we are thinking that severe weather may be a threat. If you hadn't noticed... these parameters are all for Sunday evening - around the time we are predicting the chance of severe weather. This isn't a "for sure severe weather day" by any means, but these parameters all point towards at least some marginal hail and damaging winds along with the potential for a tornado.

Time will tell, we'll see how things pan out.

~KDLT Meteorologist Jesse Ritka