Updraft® - Minnesota Weather News

Weekend forecast: Mildest temps on Saturday; rain/snow chance late Sunday

Update on snow totals

I’ll get to the weekend forecast in just a bit. First, let’s take one more look at the northern Minnesota snow totals from Wednesday into early this morning. Some locations reported double-digit snow totals:

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Snow reports from northern Minnesota
National Weather Service

You can look at the National Weather Service plot of snowfall reports here. This is how the NWS map looked around 9 a.m.:

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Snow reports through 9 a.m. Thursday
National Weather Service


You can hover over any data point on the linked NWS site to get the location and snow total plus the time of the measurement.

Temperatures and winds this weekend

If your weekend starts on Friday you’ll enjoy highs that are reasonable for March, with 30s in northern Minnesota and 40s south:

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Friday forecast highs
National Weather Service

Parts of the metro area could reach the mid 40s. Our average Twin Cities high is 39 this time of year. Friday winds will be light, due to a nearby high pressure system.

Saturday highs reach the 50s in many areas:

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Saturday forecast highs
National Weather Service

Saturday will be a bit breezy by afternoon, with wind gusts in the 10 to 16 mph range:

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Saturday noon forecast wind gusts
National Weather Service

Plotted gusts are in knots, with 12 knots equal to around 14 mph.

Sunday highs reach the 40s in most areas, with some 30s in parts of northeastern Minnesota:

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Sunday forecast highs
National Weather Service

Sunday will be breezy.

Rain/snow chance south Sunday p.m.

Most of the weekend looks dry in Minnesota and western Wisconsin. A low pressure system might spin moisture over far southern Minnesota late Sunday into Sunday night.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Global Forecast system (GFS) model shows the potential precipitation pattern Sunday and Sunday night:

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GFS model precipitation rate Sunday through Sunday night
NOAA, via Tropicaltidbits.com

It could start out as rain showers, then change to a mix or all snow in the far south late Sunday. You can hear updated weather information for Minnesota and western Wisconsin on the MPR network, and you’ll see updated weather info on the MPR News live weather blog.

Programming note

You can hear my live weather updates on MPR News at 7:35 a.m., 9:35 a.m. and 4:39 p.m. each Saturday and Sunday.