Widespread Power Outages Likely In Duluth & Superior With Christmas Week Blizzard

There's a big difference between wanting a white Christmas and getting what we got last week. We saw over 20 inches of snow in some places. Ice was falling from bridges, destroying windshields. Heavy winds and heavy wet snow also caused a lot of trees to go down and break power lines, leaving thousands of people without power. Some of them for several days.

The bad news is, we've got some really strong winds coming back with this week's system. Meteorologists are tracking the storm and right now are calling for about 6 inches of snow for most of Northwest Wisconsin and the Arrowhead region. Some places in Ashland and Iron counties could see another foot of snow by Christmas Eve.

I talked to Brandon Weather this morning from WDIO, and he broke down what we should be expecting.

Wednesday snow will arrive late morning before morning. Most of the accumulation will happen by Thursday, but the heavy winds will continue to blow snow around, creating drifts all the way through Saturday.

Get our free mobile app

Brandon also said the strong winds will cause a problem.

Unfortunately, it's very likely we will see some power outages, especially considering those strong winds and how laden our trees are from last week's snow. All that heavy snow and ice, along with the wind, is just a recipe for those trees to topple over.

The National Weather Service's Winter Storm Watch calls for wind gusts as high as 45 mph. That will definitely break some of these bending trees.

ADDITIONAL DETAILS...Snow loading on trees from the past storm
  in combination with the high winds may cause heavy tree damage
  resulting in widespread power outages in cold weather.
  Blizzard conditions are possible.

If you have a generator, make sure you have some gas for it. Plan ahead and have any battery packs charged, keep your smartphones charged up, and have some flashlights handy just in case you lose power. Hopefully, power line crews have had some time to rest up. It's going to be brutally cold with windchills -30 below zero.