First Heavy Northern Plains Snow Of The Season – Otis Rapidly Strengthened Before Landfall – National Weather Outlook For October 26, 2023

by | Oct 26, 2023 | Weather

National Weather Forecast

A complex storm is impacting the central and western United States on Thursday. This will bring the potential of heavy rain in the central U.S. with heavy snow from the Northern Rockies to the Northern Plains.

From Wednesday through Thursday, 3-5” of rain could fall from Kansas to central Texas, leading to the potential of flash flooding. Another 1-2” of rain could fall Thursday into Friday across portions of the upper Midwest, leading to at least some ponding or minor flooding as this area saw heavy rain earlier this week. Meanwhile, the first major winter storm of the season is impacting areas from the Cascades to the Northern Plains, with the potential of over a foot of snow at the higher mountain elevations.

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Hurricane Otis unleashes a ‘nightmare scenario’ Category 5 strike on Acapulco and southern Mexico

More from CNN: “Hurricane Otis unleashed a “nightmare scenario” on Acapulco in southern Mexico Wednesday morning after the storm rapidly intensified into a Category 5 just before landfall and gave officials and residents little time to prepare. Otis strengthened from a tropical storm to an extremely dangerous Category 5 hurricane in just 12 hours before it slammed ashore near Acapulco as the strongest storm on record to hit this area and the Pacific coast of Mexico. The sudden burst of power gave people little time to prepare and get to safety as Otis bore down on Acapulco, a popular tourist destination that’s also a permanent home to roughly 800,000 people.”

Climate scientists warn Earth systems heading for ‘dangerous instability’

More from ABC News: “Forecasts about the negative effects of human-caused climate change are not uncommon, but new research published Tuesday makes even more dire claims, declaring that “life on planet Earth is under siege” and that “we are pushing our planetary systems into dangerous instability.” The study, titled “The 2023 State of the Climate Report: Entering Uncharted Territory” and published in the journal Bioscience, points to specific climate events in 2023 to support its findings, including exceptional heat waves across the globe, historic and record-breaking warm ocean temperatures, and unprecedented low levels of sea ice surrounding Antarctica. The 12 international scientists who created the report indicated that in so far in 2023, there have been 38 days with global average temperatures more than 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and Europe’s Copernicus Climate Change Service earlier this month indicated that 2023 will likely go on record as the hottest year ever recorded.”

Tiny deer and rising seas: How climate change is testing the Endangered Species Act

More from NPR: “Some people keep dogs in their backyards. In the Florida Keys, some residents have deer the size of a golden retriever in their yards. As sea levels rise and salt water climbs higher on the islands, it’s shrinking habitat for this deer — which already has an estimated population of at most 1,000. Chris Bergh, the South Florida Program Manager with The Nature Conservancy, says the changes in sea level over the past decades have caused pine rockland forests in the Keys, the main habitat for the Key deer, to recede by hundreds of meters. This shrinkage is raising major ethical and logistical questions for the federal wildlife managers tasked with keeping endangered species like the Key deer alive.”

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– D.J. Kayser