HEAVY SLEET... MT. MAGAZINE

Logan County, AR

Mt. Magazine, which is the tallest mountain of Arkansas (2753') gets some unique weather. Today was no exception! Most of the sleet and freezing rain is continuing to wind down across our area, though with the feed of moisture coming in from the Southwest as we've been blogging about, Mt. Magazine has stood directly in the path of this flow and primed for orographically enhanced precipitation. Check out the activity in the center of the yellow circle. Mt. Magazine's Southern face, which in effect became the upwind side of the mountain, intercepted the moist flow and the sharp rise in elevation from the Valley floor helped to sufficiently cool and condense the moisture out of the clouds in the form of heavy sleet. The temperature profile aloft still had a layer that was slightly above freezing yielding sleet, otherwise the 18 degree temperature at top certainly would have been conducive to a quick burst of snow.

Logan County is circled in yellow. Most of the heavy precipitation blossomed around 11:15 AM Friday morning. A quick call to the State Park up on top confirmed what the radar was showing. Indeed, several of the friendly desk clerks stated that Mt. Magazine had "heavy sleet coming down" and " the roads were getting covered fast".

Check out this link to Mt. Magazines weather.
http://170.94.192.8/_stations/magazine/index_graphics.htm

Posted by Ted Zarras at 9:43 AM