Weather

A more typical look & feel to Winter over parts of the Heartland

On the Plains, cool, dry weather prevails, except for lingering snow showers across northern areas. Winds have diminished on the southern High Plains, following Thursday’s dust storm.

Across the Corn Belt, wet snow is falling in parts of the Great Lakes region, especially in the vicinity of Lakes Michigan and Huron. Snow has ended across the western Corn Belt, while windy conditions and scattered rain showers are affecting Ohio Valley. Friday morning’s snow depths include 4 inches in Des Moines, Iowa, and Lansing, Michigan, and 5 inches in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

In the South, cool, breezy weather prevails from the western Gulf Coast region into the lower Mississippi Valley. Meanwhile, showers and locally severe thunderstorms are sweeping across the Southeast, although Florida’s peninsula remains unfavorably warm and dry.

In the West, unfavorably dry conditions persist. The water equivalent of the high-elevation Sierra Nevada snow pack currently averages 7 inches, just 30 percent of normal for late February. Elsewhere, warm weather is returning to the Pacific Coast States, while cool conditions linger across the remainder of the region.