WEST MICHIGAN — We knew it was coming…we knew it would be messy, perhaps all perfect timing for Mother Nature and the official first day of winter.
As you can see from the snapshot, the FOX 17 ALERT system has everything from tornado watches and severe weather with this system in the south, to ice storm warnings and winter storm warnings across much of the Midwest and Great Lakes. We’ve already had several reports of wind damage and at least a handful of tornado reports across Arkansas and Louisiana. No question this storm is impacting or will impact some part of the 94 million Americans that will be trying to travel before Christmas.
Here in West Michigan, it appears most of our area may miss a significant ice storm, but that doesn’t mean most of us still won’t see freezing rain, sleet, and an icy mix Saturday night through Sunday morning. That said, we can also expect an inch or two of snow behind this system Sunday afternoon/evening. The heavier snow accumulations will occur across our FOX 17 northern counties with three to six inches likely since temperatures are colder and the icy mix will be substantially less.
It shouldn’t necessarily come as a complete surprise to Michiganders…we usually see at least one or two icing events per season. However, it tends to occur more in the late winter/early spring. While this system will pull out of the region later Sunday, lake-effect snow will commence on Monday with several more inches possible especially along/west of U.S. 131.
Make sure to send your weather photos and reports to news@fox17online.com. We’ll have more updates on air, online, and at our FOX 17 Facebook page. By the way, December 21 is the shortest day of the year…that means daylight starts to increase from here on in! Get more too at www.fox17online.com/weather. Have a pleasant evening and please drive safe!
