Name: Blizzard concerns in Upper Midwest as extreme wind combines with snow
Uploaded: 2025-12-18T08:45:53.218Z
Duration: 2 min 58 s
Description: As rain falls across much of the Plains and Midwest, extreme winter weather could cause problems farther north.

As rain falls across much of the Plains and Midwest, extreme winter weather could cause problems farther north.

Fargo

Blizzard conditions have developed in the Upper Midwest as strong winds combine with snowfall, particularly affecting northern parts of the plains near the Canadian border. Wind gusts have reached up to 37 mph in Fargo, and blizzard warnings are in place where wind and snow overlap, with some areas expecting up to 6 inches of snow.

The storm system is moving east, bringing rain to most regions but significant snow and wintry mix to others, especially in Wisconsin and the Great Lakes. Authorities warn of potential power outages, tree limb damage, and dangerous travel conditions due to blowing snow and reduced visibility.

Blizzard concerns in Upper Midwest as extreme wind combines with snow

Now, Anna, the issues are going to move east here with time when it comes to the wind, and there's even an area with blizzard conditions here in northern parts of the plains. Yeah, we've already started to see some of these impacts move their way into the plains, mainly the wind. That's the majority of our alerts, but let's break this down because there's a lot on the board, right? So all of the tan, those are high wind watches and warnings. I'm going to isolate here the blizzard warnings, give you an idea of where the wind and the snow overlap to create those concerns, deselect that, and then we're going to go to the red flag warnings. That's the problem to the south. So to the north, you have the precipitation, you have the moisture plus the wind. To the south, we have the wind, no moisture, fire danger increases. Now, if we go to the snow, that is where I want to focus in now, it's not a lot of snow. We're talking one to three far northern portions right along the Canadian border, three to six inches of snow, but any snowfall plus these gusty winds, that's where we get into the blizzard concerns. Let's take a look at where wind gusts stand at this point. We're seeing the wind gusts inch up in Fargo, 37 miles per hour, 26 in Pierre there, 17 in North Platte overall. You're seeing a lot of zeros and that doesn't mean there's no wind. It means just the last time there was a data refresh at those specific weather stations, the data feeds into this graphic, there was not an active wind gust being reported. It's still breezy. These are just your wind gusts, not your sustained wind speeds, and we'll see things move further to the east as time goes on and the storm moves to the east. So back to our blizzard concerns, this is the whole area that we're concerned about this. Even if you don't have an active blizzard warning, you can't rule it out, especially to these northwestern portions of Minnesota. Some of you are not quite under those blizzard warnings, but could still see the lack of visibility from the blowing snow. Here's how it all plays out on future radar. A lot of us, it's going to be rain, so I focused in on the snow because that's where some of the bigger impacts are going to be. But as we watch all of this move its way east, we'll see a little bit of a transition time period here. The pink, that's where we get into a wintry mix, could see a little bit of freezing rain, a little bit of sleet. Watch out for those slick spots. It very quickly though converts into snow as things move into Wisconsin here. To the south, it's warm enough. It really just is rain, but watch how the storm really strengthens. It matures as we move into the Ohio Valley. Heavier downpours here and the wind does continue to be a concern here. Think tree limbs down, power outages possible at the very least. The Christmas decorations could be blowing around a little bit. Now another thing to note, behind the cold front we do have some snow that's going to move through, especially the Great Lakes. Then we have one more quick clipper system that's going to move through, bringing some additional snowfall as we head into the weekend. We're definitely on that roller coaster with our temperatures overall, so just keep an eye on your AccuWeather app so you know what to expect when you head out the door each day.

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