FEATURE GRAPHIC: February 2008 Archives

The mix of precipitation to which Chicagoans rise Wednesday is but the first stage of a massive winter storm that threatens to produce one of the city’s biggest snows of the last nine years before it’s done. Weather conditions threaten to go downhill quickly from Chicago to the west and north as the intensifying system entrains cold air while being energized by the arrival of powerful jet stream winds in the morning. A wintry mix of sleet, snow and rain (mainly snow far north and mainly rain far south) switches to heavy snow and thundersnow in mid- to late morning over much of the northern half of the metro area (from Chicago north and west) whipped by strengthening northeast winds. Spells of near whiteout conditions threaten. Given the extraordinary amount of moisture this storm’s rotary circulation is expected to force back into the colder air quickly taking charge in Chicago, a consensus of computer projections is showing 8- to 14-inch snowfalls from Chicago west and north. That places the system’s snowfall among the five biggest since 1999.

STORM LEAVES UP TO 10 INCHES IN THE PLAINS

Although early snows accumulated 2-4 inches along and north of the Wisconsin border and west to Iowa late Tuesday, up to 10 inches was reported in western Kansas near Goodland.