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Surprisingly, winter has been unsurprising so far.
We enter January pretty much right where the consensus of long-term forecasts seemed to point, having gone through a mostly mild and drought-easing wet December in Southwest and Southside Virginia, with an active storm track in progress like we expect during an El Niño winter (the “more weather” prediction here in late November) and seemingly more potential for colder air to ooze into some of the wet storms and make them more wintry in weeks ahead.
That begins this weekend, with what might be the most significant wintry precipitation episode Southwest and Southside Virginia have had in almost two years — not that that’s a very high bar given the almost snowless 2022-23 winter.
Storm update: Winter weather warning issued for icy mix Saturday
A low-pressure system tracking across the South will approach our region from the southwest early Saturday. The low will spread moisture into cold air banked against the mountains, as it either transfers its energy to a new low closer to the coast or else takes a track south of our region.
The result is likely to be a mix of precipitation — snow, sleet, freezing rain and cold “plain rain” — across Southwest and Southside Virginia throughout much of Saturday. Results will vary across our region, and later forecasts should have a somewhat better handle on what type and how much precipitation falls where, with perhaps some local surprises right up to the end.
The best chance for wintry precipitation will occur in the middle of our region, from about Bluefield and Abingdon on the west side eastward to about U.S. 29, the highway connecting Danville to Lynchburg and Charlottesville, on the east side. Within this zone, most locations are likely to start as snow on Saturday morning, but then change to sleet and freezing rain from the south, and eventually barely-above-freezing cold rain in some areas. North and northwest of Roanoke, some areas may stay snow and sleet most of the day. Late Saturday as the storm begins to pull away, cold air wrapping around the back side of the storm may turn many places back to snow at least briefly before precipitation ends.
East of the U.S. 29 corridor, a period of mixed precipitation will likely give way to mostly rain, though may remain as freezing rain and sleet farther north within that zone east and north of Lynchburg. As often happens in similar setups, Southwest Virginia west of Abingdon to Bluefield may see enough warm air aloft move in from the south to the west of the cold-air wedge banked to change early mix to rain, especially in lower elevations. However, behind the storm system, upslope snow squalls blowing over the mountains by late Saturday and early Sunday may whiten some areas particularly in higher elevations that miss snow earlier.
With the system looking weaker and faster than it appeared it would be earlier in the week, combined with mixed precipitation types and borderline temperatures, most locations will probably get 2 inches or less of snow and sleet accumulation from Saturday’s storm. There could be some larger totals, potentially 3-6 inches, in areas north and west of Roanoke, especially in higher elevations and nearer the Interstate 64 corridor. The northwest part of Virginia, along and west of Interstate 81 and north of Interstate 64 (think Staunton, Harrisonburg, Winchester and westward to Hot Springs, Monterey and the Allegheny mountains at the Virginia-West Virginia border), stands the best chance to see some snowfall totals over 6 inches.
Pending details of the track and intensity of the storm system, plus even minute changes in the thermal structure of the atmosphere overhead, amounts and precipitation types can yet be different than these expectations, especially these coming three days before the storm system. A more southerly track of the low plus colder air aloft could lead to greater and more widespread snow, while the opposite could bring more areas changing to mix and rain earlier.
I expect to follow up with an update here on Cardinal News by Friday evening, and will post both on my X (formerly Twitter) handle @KevinMyattWx and on my Kevin Myatt’s Weather Wonders page on Facebook. It’s always advisable to follow the latest from the National Weather Service and your trusted local media. Forecasts may vary slightly among these entities but that actually give some perspectives on how things can vary.
Looking ahead, there may be another chance of wintry precipitation by Tuesday in at least some of our region on the front end of what will likely be another widespread soaking rain. An El Niño winter appears to be living up to its billing as we move through January. Down the road, we’ll revisit how much Arctic air becomes involved later in the season to possibly turn this wet winter into a white one for a spell.
Climate milestone for Roanoke
The number 60 has marked an important threshold in multiple historic climate categories at Roanoke. The first 60-inch rainfall year was 2018, a threshold crossed again with the previous 62.45-inch rainfall mark surpassed by two-tenths of an inch in 2020. There is still only one 60-inch snowfall winter, 62.7 inches in 1959-60. 2019 was the first time in 66 years, and only the second time since the Dust Bowl years of the 1930s, that Roanoke had more than 60 days above 90 degrees.
But the most recent 60 threshold surpassed may hold even more significance.
Roanoke’s 60.3-degree average temperature for 2023 marked the first time the Star City had averaged more than 60 degrees through a calendar year. (Not yet complete, it ranked among the Cardinal News list of the top 10 regional weather stories of 2023, though it’s really more of a climate story than weather.)
It was a runaway winner as Roanoke’s warmest year on record, going back to the start of official weather data in 1912. The officially recognized previous warmest average annual temperature on record was 59.5, in 2012, 2019, 2020 and 2021 — recent trends are obvious with that list. However, there was a 59.7-degree average in 1931 with 18 days of missing record disqualifying it. Most of those missing days of data were in February, so that could be enough to pull down the average down a little, though that was a notably hot year at several other locations in our region.
Either way, beating an annual average temperature record by either six-tenths or eight-tenths of a degree is similar to a thoroughbred winning a horse race by six or eight lengths. Most long-term annual climate records fall by a decimal or two.
Factors leading to this record:
(1) Overall climate warming. 2023 was the warmest year on record globally. The trend has clearly been toward warmer average temperature years nationally, regionally, and locally in recent decades — not a steady upward line but a tendency for more frequent years ranking among the warmest and fewer ranking among the coolest as average temperatures go up and down quite a bit as we focus more on a smaller region. Higher dew points from greater moisture transport off warmer oceans, raising low temperatures in warmer months, likely plays a key role in the warmer average temperatures.
(2) Sensor placement and urban heat island. Many regional sites had annual average temperatures among the warmest on record in 2023, but Roanoke is among the few that had its warmest year on record or has had so many extremely warm years so close together — nine of its 12 warmest since 2007. The rapid growth of commercial and industrial infrastructure around what used to be primarily pastures and light residential development near the Roanoke-Blacksburg Regional Airport has likely exacerbated urban heat island warming near the sensor site.
(3) Especially warm winter months particular to 2023. January, February and December were all above to much above normal in temperatures due to the specific atmospheric patterns of those months. February, in fact, was Roanoke’s first winter month on record to average 50 degrees. Warm winter months do more to lift annual averages than hot summer months, because the spread between historic extremes is much wider — the warmest and coolest Julys are only 10 degrees apart, while the warmest and coolest Januarys are 24 degrees apart. In this case, warm winter months actually overcame Roanoke’s coolest June in 20 years and a rather middling summer to lift the annual average.
Though it is quite possible January and February will average somewhat above normal in temperature — dependent on whether or not a significant Arctic air mass parks over the region later this winter — it appears highly unlikely that 2024 will get off to as warm a start as 2023 did. So odds are against 2024 topping the 2023 average for Roanoke, though it may well do so on a global scale with a continuing strong El Niño adding to long-term planetary warming.
Journalist Kevin Myatt has been writing about weather for 20 years. His weekly column, appearing on Wednesdays, is sponsored by Oakey’s, a family-run, locally owned funeral home with locations throughout the Roanoke Valley.
