Kansas City could ring in new year with ice storm, snow beginning early Friday morning
Kansas Citians could wake up to a combination of freezing rain and snow in the new year, according to FOX4 meteorologist Karli Ritter.
“We have an interesting last day of 2020,” said Ritter, who provides weather updates to The Star. “It’s actually going to be quite nice through about midnight, so I think we’ll finish out the year on a very quiet note, but very quickly conditions will be switching over to more active after midnight.”
A wintry mix will likely start spreading across the metro in the first couple hours of the new year, she said.
Then by 6 or 7 a.m., things will really start to ramp up, Ritter said.
A winter weather advisory remains in effect from midnight through 6 p.m. Friday, according to the National Weather Service.
“As we go through the morning we are going to be talking about a wintry mix of freezing rain, maybe a little bit of sleet,” Ritter said. “And then by mid-morning and into the lunch hour, we’re switching over to snowfall, with the heaviest freezing rain issues just east of Kansas City.”
She said as a result, the snow will fall a little longer, and the snowfall totals will be a little bit higher than initially anticipated, likely measuring between two and four inches.
The snow will likely be finished by mid-evening, Ritter said, “certainly by 10 o’clock.”
“As far as ice is concerned, it’s still possible we have near ice storm conditions, but the greater likelihood of that happening is east of Kansas City with a glaze off to our north and west,” she added.
Saturday will have a high temperature of 28 and then Sunday and Monday will see highs in the upper 40s.
“We have a cold forecast to kick off the new year,” Ritter said. “A wintry one as well before we warm up back into the middle of next week.”
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The Star produced this weather update in partnership with the local FOX4 television station. The station’s meteorologists create forecast videos multiple times a day for the newspaper to include in its weather reports.
