Seattle winter: Next system brings another metro mix

Seattle winter

If this was a real Minnesota winter we'd be digging out from about 6 inches of fresh snow in the metro right now. Instead, your lawn is still lush green, streets are wet and your sump pump is probably running at full speed.

Monday's storm was just too warm again for (much) snow. Plenty of moisture? Check. Nice wound up low pressure system? Roger that. Favorable storm track climatology for heavy snow in December? Absolutely. Arctic air wrapping into system to change rain to heavy snow? Not so much.

Too warm to snow. Open water lakes in the metro and dangerous ice conditions up north. Gray, misty and damp. Green grass in (mid) December.

Where's my latte?

El Niño signal

You can blame the strongest El Niño in at least a generation for our Seattle winter so far. El Niño may be at or just past peak in the tropical Pacific, but the atmospheric effects of all that warm water will probably linger into spring.

December rainfall records

Monday's December rainstorm dumped uncanny rainfall totals for the Upper Midwest in December. A swath of rainfall over 2 inches with some 4 to 6 inch rainfall totals reports across Iowa and Wisconsin. Yes, this would have been Snowmageddon in a "normal" winter.

The system set an all-time winter record for the most rainfall in Eau Claire. A clear symptom of an atmosphere that has way too much water vapor to be Minnesota in December.

Remarkable December warmth

So far we are on pace for the warmest December on record. We may not keep the No. 1 slot as colder air moves in later this week, but looking at the forecast I can see a good chance that this will end up as one of the top five warmest Decembers on record for much of Minnesota.

Some Twin Cities numbers so far.

• +14 degrees vs. average in December so far at MSP Airport

• 0 number of daytime highs below freezing at MSP in December

• 3 record daily 'high minimum' temperatures this month

• 36.2 degrees average temperature at MSP so far this December

• 33.8 degrees warmest December on record (1887-8)

• 0.1" December snowfall at MSP Airport so far

Rainfall soaking in

I've been asked if the soil has frozen in the metro and southern Minnesota yet. Not even close. Soil temperatures are running in the upper 30s and low 40s at depth at the University of Minnesota's St. Paul Campus. We are now a week past the December 8 average date of initial soil freeze in the metro. No frost here.

Free ice rides on Red Lake

All kidding aside this could have turned out much worse. Thankfully everyone was rescued on Red Lake after sustained high winds broke loose massive ice floes and sent them out into the huge lake.

MPR News' John Enger covered the story. Here's an excerpt that pretty much sums up our mild El Niño winter so far.

When an ice floe broke loose this morning roughly 50 people found themselves on the wrong side of a widening strip of open water.

According to the Beltrami County Sheriff's department, a series of 911 calls came in from portable ice houses a little before 10 a.m. The anglers said they were drifting away from shore on a piece of ice.

By the time rescue crews from the Kelliher Fire Department arrived, Deputy Chief Ross Rennemo said the ice was shifting quickly. Even as they looked for safe areas to cross between sheets, he watched one narrow crack grow wider to more than 40 feet of open water.

"It's moving all the time," he said, "depending on which way the wind is blowing."

His 10-person team launched an inflatable boat and eventually found a route for anglers to cross on foot.

"No one got wet," he said. "It's a good outcome."

Most of the anglers were staying at Roger's Resort on the southeast corner of Upper Red Lake, 60 miles north of Bemidji.

Co-owner Chris Freudenberg was there when the ice began to shift. He said it's been a bad year for ice fishing at his resort.

"We've been having issues we've never had to deal with before," he said. "It just won't get cold."

Here's an eye opening satellite shot, what might look like solid ice from shore is clearly loose icebergs floating on massive Red Lake.

Next system takes aim

As I expected last week, our pattern is getting much more active. The jet stream is dealing us a steady diet of inbound low pressure systems. What the last week's models didn't grasp is the sheer magnitude of El Niño enhanced warm air feeding into these systems. That means more rain than snow. Here's the next system. Another rain/snow metro mix will disappoint snow lovers, but this system looks cold enough for mostly snow in the Red River Valley and much of western and northern Minnesota.

The best probability for 4 inches or more? Well north and west of the Twin Cities. The trip up I-94 to Fargo will be interesting by Wednesday morning.

Here's the Twin Cities NWS view.

From the Grand Forks NWS office.

And from Duluth.

Briefly wintry later this week

It finally starts to feel like December around here by Thursday. We enjoy three days of more typical December temperatures, and maybe even some welcome sunshine. The Euro is hinting at another sloppy system next Monday.

I'm still not writing off a white Christmas in the metro just yet. But my thoughts last week of an 80 percent chance are looking a bit too optimistic at this point. The maps are still all over the place for Christmas week. Weather fingers and toes crossed they come up white.

The longer range outlooks continue to come up in bright shades of El Niño red across the eastern U.S.

The outlook for January? More of the same.

Look for more records to fall in the coming weeks.