This vehicle was damaged in a multi-vehicle accident on Interstate 77 in Carroll County on Sunday morning. A person died in another vehicle involved in the accident. Rain was moving through the area with temperatures near or just below freezing, with icy conditions being considered as a possible factor in the accident, state police said. Courtesy of Hillsville Fire Department Facebook page.
This vehicle was damaged in a multi-vehicle accident on Interstate 77 in Carroll County on Sunday morning. A person died in another vehicle involved in the accident. Rain was moving through the area with temperatures near or just below freezing, with icy conditions being considered as a possible factor in the accident, state police said. Courtesy of Hillsville Fire Department Facebook page.

After a scrape with patchy freezing rain on Sunday morning, two more potential episodes of wintry precipitation loom for Southwest and Southside Virginia in this first week of December.

One person died in a multi-vehicle accident on Interstate 77 in Carroll County on Sunday morning, with wintry weather possibly a factor, state police said.

A band of rain moved across western Virginia near and shortly after dawn with temperatures in the 31-34-degree range. That caused ice to develop in some locations while others escaped with just cold dampness. The National Weather Service had issued a winter weather advisory for a large part of western Virginia ahead of Sunday morning’s spotty ice.

A second and possibly somewhat more widespread round of wintry mix — snow, sleet and freezing rain — is expected overnight Monday into early Tuesday.

Red colors indicate high probabilities of receiving at least .01 inch of freezing rain in the 24 hours before early Tuesday evening centered in the areas west of the Blue Ridge with moderate chances over much of the rest of Cardinal News' Southwest and Southside Virginia coverage area. Courtesy of Weather Prediction Center, NOAA.
Red colors indicate high probabilities of receiving at least .01 inch of freezing rain in the 24 hours before early Tuesday evening centered in the areas west of the Blue Ridge, with moderate chances over much of the rest of Cardinal News’ Southwest and Southside Virginia coverage area. Courtesy of Weather Prediction Center, NOAA.

A low-pressure system tracking northeast will cause a broad area of snow to fall in colder atmospheric conditions to the west and north of Virginia, but may also pull moisture into colder air trapped near the surface against the mountains. This would cause a few hours of mixed wintry precipitation over much of our region — some locations may escape with 33- or 34-degree rain — that could again ice some road surfaces for Tuesday morning, before most precipitation changes to plain old rain.

Wintry precipitation is expected to be more intense, and last longer, the farther one is north and west across our region. Large amounts are not expected, but it doesn’t take much to cause slick conditions on roadways.

Yet another storm system is expected to approach the Eastern U.S. late in the week. It looks probable that cold air will be more firmly entrenched against the Appalachians ahead of that storm as high pressure pushes it southward. Depending on the storm’s track, evolution and how much moisture it can push into the cold air, anything from another minor, brief scrape of wintry precipitation to a more significant winter storm is a possibility for our region by Friday. Deeper cold air could also increase the chance that more of that precipitation would fall as snow.

We have a few days to track that storm, and to get past whatever Monday night and early Tuesday bring us.

The overall atmospheric pattern suggests occasional reinforcements of cold air — somewhat below normal temperatures for early December, not, as of yet, frigid cold — with storm systems periodically moving around the edge of the cold air through the first half of December.

While each system will have to be monitored for snow or ice potential, the moisture from cold rain and whatever wintry mix occurs will be helpful in quelling dryness for a region in which a large part has fallen into moderate drought, according to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor.

Much of Virginia is rated as having a slight chance, 10 to 30 percent, of seeing snow and sleet equivalent to at least .25 inch of liquid, which would be 2.5 inches or more if all snow, on Friday. This forecast is subject to movement up or down as more details become known about the late-week storm system and the depth of cold air ahead of it. Courtesy of Weather Prediction Center, NOAA.
Much of Virginia is rated as having a slight chance, 10 to 30 percent, of seeing snow and sleet equivalent to at least .25 inch of liquid, which would be 2.5 inches or more if all snow, on Friday. This forecast is subject to movement up or down as more details become known about the late-week storm system and the depth of cold air ahead of it. Courtesy of Weather Prediction Center, NOAA.

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.  

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Kevin Myatt has written about Southwest and Southside Virginia weather for the past two decades, previously...