- Bottom line, most of the state will likely see precipitation this weekend due to a stronger system.
- The hard part of the forecast is trying to decipher who experiences just a plain rain, and who experiences frozen precipitation.
- We don't mind saying now that it's likely some of us will see some sort of frozen precipitation, we just don't know the extent of it, nobody does.
- Model data has been consistent in showing the idea of frozen precipitation, but it's been all over the place the last few days on the location and timing.
 |
| Friday Evening |
Prior to any winter weather, we will likely see a cold rain on Friday. Notice the red line (labeled with 32) at the top of the model image? That's the freezing line (32 degrees or below), notice this line is well above the state into portions of Missouri.
 |
| Late Friday/Early Saturday Morning |
By late Friday night into early Saturday morning, things COULD get interesting. Notice the pink colors (winter mix) mixed with the green (rain). The GFS is trying to spit out some sort of winter mix as the freezing air begins to flush south.
 |
| Lunch Time - Saturday |
Fast forward to Saturday around lunch time. Notice the pink colors (winter mix) are still mixed with the green (rain). The GFS is continuing to try to spit out a winter mix for portions of northern Arkansas as the cold air remains stagnant around northern Arkansas. Notice the rest of Arkansas is green, as the freezing line is bottled around our northern border.
 |
| Late Saturday Night |
Looking even further into late Saturday into early Sunday morning, we could still be dealing with some sort of wintry precipitation. Notice the freezing line has pushed further south, transitioning some of the rain to possibly snowfall.
Now, you've seen our the latest accessible model data. Here is where it gets confusing. Let's take a look at different time frame model runs.
 |
| Saturday (Lunch Time) 12z run |
Above is the GFS model valid for around lunch time on Saturday. This is the 12z run (the model run prior to the latest). Notice the freezing line is pushed well south, allowing a much more drastic change to winter weather well into southern Arkansas.
Now, here is the same exact model (GFS) for the same time period (lunch time Saturday). The only difference is the model run, as this is the 18z run (latest model data 6:56 PM 12-3-18). We've placed the same exact models here, only they are two different solutions. Notice in this model run the freezing line comes NOWHERE near to the extent of the previous run. If this solution verified, it would keep most of Arkansas at a cold rain with a winter mix for far northern Arkansas.
This is the frustrating part of trying to forecast winter weather. Every model run is different, we will NOT have a good idea of what could actually happen until right before the event (24-36 hours). Hopefully this helps better explain the situation. We know some of you may wonder about your city, or county, but we simply cannot give a valuable forecast at this time.
Nonetheless, we'll be watching this all week and have updates as we get more information. Thank you for reading!
-AW
