If you caught our 10pm broadcast last night, we were downplaying any snow chances for Nashville. However, I was very confident about forecasting an accumulating snow in the eastern parts of Middle Tennessee, especeially the Cumberland Plateau.
I am often asked if Middle Tennessee is one of the hardest places to forecast weather. I say no, except for forecasting snow. In my 24 years of weather forecasting in Middle Tennessee, I’ve come up for a term for this…instead of “no show’, I call it “no snow”.

The situation:
Low pressure leaving the Gulf and heading though Alabama and Georgia…cold surface temps in place, with the freezing line aloft expected to drop southward by morning…the higher elevations of Eastern Middle Tennessee being more vulnerable to snow, as well as closer to the low itself. It all adds up to snow!

So what happened?

Two things that I can see: First, the low never got “wound up” where the precip would expand northward and circulate counter clockwise around it (a closed low). Secondly, we seemed to have some drier air in place aloft intruding from the north with our colder air dropping south. The result, very little precip made it into our colder air in Tennessee, with most of it staying in Alabama and Georgia. If I had the same data, I might have to say the same thing again. I felt even more confident when the National Weather Service issued a Snow Advisory for the norhern Plateau.

But don’t worry, we’ll have more snow chances this winter, and we’ll break out the snow sleds eventually.

As low pressure pushes northeastward into Georgia by tomorrow morning, rain showers will change to snow towards morning. In Nashville, we expect a dusting, at most, during the first half of the day. In eastern Middle Tennessee from around Center Hill Lake eastward onto the plateau, we could see 2-3″ during the first half of the day. In between, from around Carthage to Woodbury to Manchester we could see about an inch.

The precip should end by noon in Nashville, and by 2pm in east Middle Tennessee.

Tricky forecast today and tonight. A cold front moved through middle Tennessee this morning and dropped temperatures through the morning hours for the western half of our area. The eastern half will likely see temperatures holding through the afternoon in the low 40’s. The cold front moves into northern Georgia and stalls. Then rain/snow starts to form along the front and effects middle Tennessee tonight into tomorrow mid-day. We’ll see snow tonight and tomorrow morning but for the core of the metro area roads should be okay, it usually takes at least a 12 hour stretch of below freezing temperatures for them to get cold enough for the snow to stick. The southern portions of the plateau might see some accumulation since the snow will last longer into Monday there. Like I said, tricky forecast but for most of us just a brush of winter weather (read: snow) and a cold, windy day on Monday. Second day back and I get this! -Jeff Ray

My thinking from earlier today is turning out to be right, unfortunately. Our southern counties are being primed by warm moist air behind a warm front, and hence a tornado watch is in effect for there until 5 am. This warm air is the fuel for possible tornadoes as a low pressure center and accompanying cold front push through the area.

Meanwhile, in North Middle Tennessee, there is still the possibility of damaging winds and large hail.

We are doing cut ins during the ball game, and will have the latest on News 2 after the game.

Here on the web site, click on the “Watches and Warning” icon above (and hit refresh often) for the latest bulletins.
Follow Stormtracker on The Nashville Weather Channel on Comcast 185, or on frquency 2.2 on a digital receiver.

Some of these storms overnight could contain winds in excess of 60mph as well as large hail. An isolated tornado is also possible with these storms. The storms should be around from now until about 2 am for Middle Tennessee, 3 am for East.

We are now doing weather cut ins during the ball game on News 2. You can tune in and get the latest during breaks in the game.

For the latest watches and warnings here on the web site, click on the “Watches and Warnings” Icon above, and refresh regularly. You can also catch the latest Stormtracker information on “The Nashville Weather Channel”
on Comcast Digital Cable 185, or digital UHF singal 2.2.