Winter Storm in South Clearwater, Minnesota

A Colorado Low took shape during the early morning hours of Saturday, December 28th, with an inverted trough extending up toward the Red River Valley. During the day, the surface low tracked into eastern Nebraska, but the inverted trough remained over the valley. This allowed snow to spread slowly from the South Dakota border up to the highway 2 corridor. It was a very mild day, with high temperatures in the low 30s over southeast North Dakota and west central Minnesota, to the lower 20s in the Devils Lake region. Temperatures did not change much Saturday night, as the surface low tracked from eastern Nebraska up into north central Iowa. Meanwhile, the snow finally reached the Canadian border, and north to northeast winds continued to increase. From Sunday into Sunday night, the surface low lingered over southwest Minnesota, before it finally began to fill. This kept a prolonged period of gusty north winds and steady snow over eastern North Dakota and the northwest quarter of Minnesota. From 5 to 17 inches of snow fell across the area, with the highest totals generally over the central Red River Valley into portions of southeast North Dakota. Winds along and west of the Red River Valley also gusted from 40 to 50 mph, causing blizzard conditions from Sunday morning through Monday morning. Interstate 29 was closed in eastern North Dakota and Interstate 94 was closed from Fargo to Bismarck.