National Weather Service United States Department of Commerce

Snowy, Very Cold and Windy from the Northern Plains to Great Lakes; Critical Fire Weather in South Texas

Moderate to heavy lake effect snow is expected downwind of the Great Lakes, with the Chicago metro potentially receiving 6 to 12 inches of snowfall. A frigid airmass will bring very cold temperatures to the Central U.S. and Mississippi Valley today, migrating into the Eastern U.S. on Monday. Dry and windy weather will bring critical fire weather conditions to South Texas today. Read More >


The following graphics depict the number of days that a given site has reached 90 degrees or more this year (on the x-axis) and the annual precipitation to date (on the y-axis). Also included are prior years, color coded by decade, and the 10th, 25th, 50th (i.e., median), 75th, and 90th percentiles for each variable. These graphics show us how hot and dry (or cool and wet) the current year is compared to the period of record and may be useful in drought monitoring.

Many of these sites are maintained by cooperative observers, a program which you can learn more about here. We are in the process of quality controlling past data, so some of these values are subject to change. To view the percentiles, hover over a location on the left after choosing the desired region of interest along the top of the page. Data courtesy of the Applied Climate Information System.