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Winter Makes a Returned Appearance With Temperatures Forecast to be Below Freezing for the Week

Campus at App State Saturday morning.

Winter returned with a cold front that roared through the High Country Friday night with 20 mph winds, gusting to close to 40 mph. A dusting of snow has turned the ground white again as snow flurries are expected through the day on Saturday. Ray’s Weather is forecasting blustery winds tonight that will drive wind chills before zero and minus 20 degrees on mountaintops.

The four-day warm spell brought with it over 3 inches of rain, the first decent rain in over a month. Ski slope operators said the rain was a blessing for them as their water reservoirs for snowmaking were getting depleted after a 10 day run of almost continuous snowmaking. Sugar Mountain was pumping 4200 gallons of water per minute (252,000 gallons per hour) that allowed them to get 95% of their slopes open. With snowmaking weather back in place, Sugar reports that they should have 100% of their slopes open by Monday. Talia Freeman at Beech Mountain resort says that the snow on the slopes held up really well during the rains saying, ”The rains hasn’t affected our product much at all.”

Temperatures are forecast to remain below freezing through the work week with Wednesday being the coldest before warming up again next weekend. See Ray’s Weather forecast here:  Ray’s Weather.