South America Daily Snow
By Luke Stone, Forecaster Posted 1 year ago May 21, 2024
A lot of Storm Left For Chile and Argentina
Summary
The second major May snowstorm for South America has already blanketed the mountains with snow and we're still in the early stages of this one. This system will stick around through Thursday and will be followed by some snow showers over the weekend. We should dry out early next week and stay that way as the storm track shifts to the south.
Short Term Forecast
It's been dumping since Sunday afternoon across the Andes, especially in the northern zone. A lot more snow is on the way through Thursday as this active early season pattern continues.
Below are a few shots from Monday as heavy snow fell across most of the region.
Remnants from the decaying atmospheric river discussed in the previous post will linger through Thursday providing abundant moisture in the northern zone. You can see the moisture remaining in the north in the GIF below, which shows the precipitable water compared to normal. The moisture in the atmosphere is nearly 200% of normal in the northern zone through Thursday, providing the juice for the continued heavy snow.
The heaviest snow will fall through Thursday morning, before turning more showery throughout the day. Significant additional snow is expected, as you can see in the snow forecast below.
Portillo, Valle Nevado, El Colorado, and La Parva will be in the bullseye for the rest of the storm, while additional accumulations in the central zone will be much less. While the snow continues to hammer in the north through Thursday, the storm will mostly wrap up in the central zone by Wednesday night. An additional .5 - 1.5 m can be expected in the north through Thursday.
After a brief break on Friday, a weaker storm will move through the region this weekend. Some of the models have been trending a bit stronger with this system over the last forty-eight hours, but I don't expect more than 10 - 20 cm for the central and northern zones.
Extended Forecast
After the weekend storm, we should start to dry out early next week. As the storm track shifts south we'll be north of the action through the end of next week. One of the storms could graze the southern and central zones midweek but the latest guidance keeps the majority of the precipitation to the south. It bears watching, though. The next chance for a major storm comes at the end of the month, around the following weekend. It's too early for details though, as the signal isn't overwhelmingly strong at this time.
Thanks for reading the South America Daily Snow!
Next update on Thursday.
Luke Stone
Forecaster, OpenSnow
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