7-Day Forecast: Wintry Mix Possible Saturday Night

We’ve got one final day in the 60’s but old man winter comes roaring back in full force tomorrow.

We are entering into a very, very difficult forecasting period across all of the Southeast US. A series of disturbances in the atmosphere over the next few days could result in snow for some of the region, as well as a wintry mix for Habersham County.

A line of showers/storms pushed through early this morning, bringing gusty winds along with it and severe warnings to our west. A front cleared in their wake, and winds will turn gusty behind it across the area today. Highs will still reach the low-60’s, but winds will gust as high as 35MPH, especially early on in the day.

By Saturday we’ll see much colder temps start to move in with highs only in the mid-50’s at best. The higher elevations will likely top out in the upper-40’s. Clouds will be on the increase through the day with an isolated sprinkle possible. The weather models diverge significantly into Saturday night, with the latest Euro actually keeping us primarily dry. The hi-res NAM model, however, moves widespread precipitation into the region around midnight lasting through mid-morning on Sunday. Some of this precip will likely fall as snow, especially in the higher elevations. The graphic below highlights the areas most likely to see some light, brief accumulations from this system. Here in Habersham early risers could see the precip transition to a rain/snow mix during the pre-dawn hours. It is worth noting that the GFS also shows this potential.

The precip will move out on Sunday morning and we will see a brief dry period. A low pressure system is expected to develop somewhere in either the Northern Gulf or off the GA/SC coast by late Sunday into Monday, and this could spread another round of precip into the area. As of the latest model runs, this precip looks to stay a cold rain across North Georgia, with the only frozen precip chance coming at the higher elevations as the low pressure system winds up to our north and cold air begins to squeeze out the moisture. The higher elevations of Rabun County will see the best chance of any frozen precip, and this system certainly bears watching in the event it trends a bit colder (or warmer). I’ll be monitoring this situation extremely closely and keep you up to date on the latest.

This system will keep a chance of rain in the area through the first half of Tuesday before a strong cold front sweeps through. This will usher our coldest air in a month into the region with a hard freeze looking likely on both Wednesday and Thursday mornings, and afternoon highs only recovering into the 40’s on Wednesday.

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