In the short-term, temperatures will be cold Tuesday with a steady warming trend over the next week.
Tuesday morning will see lows in the upper 20s and low 30s but even colder temperatures are expected for Wednesday morning with some spots in NW Arkansas in the upper teens.
The warming trend will be slow and steady into the weekend with dry weather until around the start of February.
The next big cold blast will arrive around February 3rd or 4th.
There are some indications that mid-February will be bitterly cold again; so we may see at least another chance for some snow before the winter ends.
Here’s what it looks like:
Tuesday morning the front will be across the southeast with blustery northwest winds in our area.
The normal high in NW Arkansas is around 47º for this time of year. Highs by the weekend may near 70º.
In the Fort Smith, River Valley area we’ll see a few days of below normal temperatures followed by a warm up into next week.
This map shows February 3rd with another strong arctic front sweeping across the state.
One of the indices we use to estimate long term trends is something call the North Atlantic Oscillation. A ‘negative’ phase usually coincides with colder temperatures here with a ‘positive’ phase usually causing warmer than normal weather.
After a large positive phase to end January, the NAO goes sharply downward into the middle of the month. There’s still some uncertainty this far out. While no snow is in the forecast it does appear that winter will indeed come back for the middle of February with at least near-normal temperatures and possible colder than normal weather for the middle of the month.
-Garrett
