429 FXUS63 KJKL 300440 AAA AFDJKL AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION...UPDATED National Weather Service Jackson KY 1140 PM EST Mon Dec 29 2025 .KEY MESSAGES... - Snow flurries will be around into the overnight hours as much colder air settles into eastern Kentucky. - Some light snow accumulations are possible Wednesday night into Thursday with a weak and progressive system brushing the area from the north and northeast. - Though there is considerable uncertainty at this time, especially with regards to temperatures, we are monitoring a southern stream system which has some potential to bring a cold rain and perhaps some wintry precipitation to parts of the area Friday night into early Saturday. - Wintery temperatures will persist through the end of 2025 and into the beginning of 2026. && .UPDATE... Issued at 1130 PM EST MON DEC 29 2025 No significant changes were made to the forecast with mainly just the inclusion of the latest obs and trends for the T/Td/Sky grids and a touch up to PoPs based on the ongoing pockets of light snow and plentiful flurries. These adjustments have been sent to the NDFD and web servers along with a freshening of the zones and SAFs. UPDATE Issued at 640 PM EST MON DEC 29 2025 23Z sfc analysis shows Arctic high pressure pushing into Kentucky this evening while cyclonic flow continues over our part of the state. This is supporting upslope winds from the west to northwest at 10 to 20 mph with occasionally higher gusts now before diminishing later this evening. Limited lower level moisture and those winds are continuing to provide the right conditions for times of snow flurries across much of eastern Kentucky. Currently, temperatures are running from the low 20s north to the mid 20s in the south. Meanwhile, dewpoints are generally in the mid teens. Have updated the forecast mainly to add in the latest obs and trends for the T/Td/Sky grids, but also to expand the flurries this evening for most of the area. These minor adjustments have been sent to the NDFD and web servers along with a freshening of the zones and SAFs. && .SHORT TERM...(This evening through Tuesday night) Issued at 350 PM EST MON DEC 29 2025 Temperatures are 40 to 50 degrees colder at most locations at 345 PM compared to this same time yesterday, courtesy of a powerful cold front which passed overnight. Thermometers range from the low/mid 20s north of I-64 to the low 30s in the Middlesboro Basin. Very light flurries are occurring at times from a thin stratus deck while cold air advection continues to feed a frigid air mass into the Commonwealth. A glance at the surface weather map reveals last night's front now moving off the Mid- Atlantic Seaboard, while its parent ~980 mb low lifts across Southern Quebec, nearly vertically stacked under a deep 500hPa low/trough aloft. A strong ridge is noted along the West Coast, and surface high pressure resides over the High Plains. While moisture is very limited, it does appear that there will be a sufficient thin layer of moisture along with the continued cold air advection and upslope flow component to keep the stratus deck and flurries going over the Eastern Kentucky Coalfields into the first half of tonight. The flurry activity might increase a little after sunset but should gradually wane after midnight as the low-level flow and cold air advection relax. Weak height rises follow on Tuesday with clearing skies, though we remain sandwiched in a modest pressure gradient between surface high pressure consolidating to our southwest over the Southern Plains and the low which will continue to deepen over Eastern Canada. Shortwave energy riding around the periphery of the 500 hPa trough will glance the Ohio Valley Tuesday night. For eastern Kentucky, the most notable impact from this disturbance will be a tightening pressure gradient, likely keeping a breeze going through the night, as well as some increase in cloud cover. A few flurries cannot be ruled out over northeast Kentucky, but no impacts are expected. In sensible weather terms, look for cold temperatures to persist. Cloud cover will be prevalent tonight, along with the possibility of a few flurries, with low temperatures in the upper teens to near 20 for most. The busy westerly breeze, gusting 15 to 30 mph this evening, will slowly relax overnight. Looking ahead to Tuesday, temperatures will struggle to reach freezing across most of the area, in spite of partly to mostly sunny skies. Clouds become prevalent again Tuesday night, and westerly breezes at 5 to 10 mph persist for many locations with a bit of gustiness, especially in open terrain and on ridgetops. Look for lows in the lower to mid 20s. A few flurries cannot be ruled out, primarily over the Big Sandy Basin and north of the Mountain Parkway. .LONG TERM...(Wednesday through Monday) Issued at 429 PM EST MON DEC 29 2025 An amplified long wave pattern will remain in place through the close of 2025. A deep cutoff low will persist over southeastern Canada, with broad troughing fanned southward all the way through the eastern Gulf of America. Further west, sharper ridging will be aligned from western Canada through the Desert Southwest. The closed low will gyre in and around Hudson Bay through the start of 2026. This feature then diminishes through this weekend and into early next week, as the aforementioned ridge translates downstream and effectively cancels out the once established broad cyclonic flow and transitions it to more zonal flow. While the models have come into somewhat better agreement on the evolution of this, some uncertainty still remains regarding the smaller scale details. On Wednesday, return flow will engage out ahead of an approaching clipper-type storm system. Temperatures will rebound into the upper 30s north of the Mountain Parkway, to the mid 40s bordering Tennessee. This clipper will bring the next chance of light snow to eastern Kentucky to ring in the new year. Models continue to indicate only a brush from this storm system, with the majority of the moisture/upper level support remaining just to our northeast. As such, most impacts will be limited, and mainly confined to along and east of US-23. A slight cool down will occur Thursday behind the departed clipper, with highs a few degrees less than Wednesday. Temperatures will then rebound back to near normal readings through the weekend, and even above normal by early next week, with mainly 40s seen each day, and some 50s in the south. A southern stream system will affect eastern Kentucky Friday through Saturday. Have kept PoPs nearly steady-state in the forecast, given the somewhat lower probabilities seen in some of the ensemble data compared to yesterday. Temperatures have more decisively trended warmer though leading into this system, increasing confidence that this would mainly fall in the form of rain. There will also likely be a tighter cutoff to the measurable precipitation north to south compared to what is currently reflected in the forecast. Dry weather returns for the second half of the weekend and into early next week, with a transient surface high pressure passing through the region. && .AVIATION...(For the 06Z TAFS through 06Z Wednesday night) ISSUED AT 1140 PM EST MON DEC 29 2025 A mostly high end MVFR cloud deck will persist over the bulk of eastern Kentucky until between 06 and 09Z. Light snow showers and flurries will remain possible, at times, but confidence in tangible impacts at a particular terminal remains too low to mention in the TAFs aside from VCSH and a near term tempo group. Westerly winds at around 10 kts with gusts up to 20 kts initially will gradually subside through the early morning hours. After 09Z, the lower cloud deck is expected to start to break up/erode from the west. Look for benign, VFR conditions on Tuesday with winds generally from the west at 5 to 10 kts. && .JKL WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES... None. && $$ UPDATE...GREIF SHORT TERM...GEERTSON LONG TERM...JKL AVIATION...GREIF