TL;DR – Showery today turning heavier tonight with heavier snow likely west of SLC. Drying and warming for the weekend with no major storms looking likely next week.
Nowcast – No snow in the past 24 hours but this morning we have extensive cloud cover and a few showers around. Wasatch crest winds have shifted from the unusual eastern direction to a more typical westerly.
Short term – Today and tomorrow, Utah will be under the influence of a trough that is slowing moving through. The trough is best seen below where northern Utah is on the SE side of the trough axis, a favorable location for precipitation and snow in the mountains!
As this trough works its way through today, it won’t bring as much steady precip as it will showery weather. Mountain accumulations won’t be very impressive today as a result. Tonight into tomorrow represents higher uncertainty though. It looks like a steadier band of snow will set up somewhere bringing with it higher snowfall totals. Right now, this band looks to set up west of I-15 favoring the Oquirrhs and Stansbury’s vs the Wasatch.
The Wasatch will still get snow though. I’m thinking most ski areas pick up between 6-12 inches between now and late Friday. This could certainly change though if the band shifts to the east.
Long term – Following this event, Saturday dries out and we take a break for a bit. Monday and Tuesday a fairly cold trough looks to drop in. It looks moisture starved, so not much snow is expected at this point. After that, a big ridge appears likely to build in warming temperatures significantly for the end of next week.
CJ Sawyer