Weather

Bitter cold settles into the northern Plains

On the Plains, cold, dry weather prevails. Monday morning’s low temperatures remained mostly above 0°F in the northern High Plains’ winter wheat belt, but dipped below -10°F in parts of western North Dakota.

Across the Corn Belt, colder air is settling across the upper Midwest, while mild weather prevails in the Ohio Valley. A shallow snow cover exists across much of the northern Corn Belt, where depths include 4 inches in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and 3 inches in Lansing, Michigan.

In the South, drought-easing rain showers are spreading across the lower Southeast, although the southern-half of Florida’s peninsula remains extremely dry. Elsewhere, mild, dry weather favors early-season fieldwork.

In the West, patchy rain and snow showers are mostly confined to the Pacific Coast States. High-elevation snow packs remain significantly below average for late February in California, Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, western Colorado, and central and southern Idaho.