A significant cold front moved through North and Central Texas over the MLK Jr. Holiday weekend.
Every event with a place to put it; 10 filed by county or forecast zone are drawn at its center, in a lighter ring. Tap one for its entry below.
Deaths and injuries are direct and indirect together, as the offices filed them. Damage is property and crops in the dollars of the year, not adjusted for inflation, and only where an office estimated it.
The episode as NWS FWD wrote it up.
A significant cold front moved through North and Central Texas over the MLK Jr. Holiday weekend. This brought cold air into the region, along with several areas of snow, sleet, and freezing rain.
The local office's own words before the first event, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.
NWS Fort Worth, TX wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at Jan 15, 11:20 PM CST, 40 minutes earlier.
Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Fort Worth TX 1120 PM CST Mon Jan 15 2018 .AVIATION... /06Z TAFs/ Trends being held pretty close to 00z TAF discussion (below this discussion), though the precipitation, mixed or otherwise is fairly light due to some very dry surface to boundary layer air as noted by the very dry surface dew point temperatures building in from the north. Some evaporation is likely occurring and thus visibilities continue to be mostly VFR, as are cigs. Precip across DFW Metro airports is occasional very light sleet and snow and now transitioning to mostly light snow or flurries. Only light accums are expected, despite temps falling below freezing, as road and ground temps vary between the mid 30s-mid 40s. Any light wintry precipitation will likely end between 08z-10z and before daybreak Tuesday, as the deeper dry air continues filtering in and the shortwave lifts east away from the area. Otherwise, gusty north winds 15-20 knots with gusts to as high as 30 knots will continue overnight, weakening with less gustiness during the day Tuesday. By late afternoon/early evening Tuesday, clearing skies and a very chilly airmass will allow rapid decoupling by nightfall with north winds 5-8 knots. As for Waco, a little sleet has mixed in at times, but any mixing with, or transformation to a little light snow will likely hold off until after midnight and last possibly through daybreak Tuesday. Otherwise, all other trends are similar with cigs and winds improving into early Tuesday. I have inserted more optimistic vsby and cig conditions at all airports, despite hit and miss, light wintry precipitation. 05/ && .AVIATION... /Issued 653 PM CST Mon Jan 15 2018/ /00z TAFs/ Concerns: Strength winds both sustained and gusts through tonight and timing precipitation transition and cig trends. This is a very complex forecast with regard to winter precipitation with confidence low on EXACT timing of changeover. I do have better confidence on cig trends and continued very gusty north winds overnight. Currently, a strong arctic cold front was surging into Central Texas. Strong low level cold advection and increasing mixing of unidirectional north-northeast low of 35-40 knots below a deepening frontal inversion were creating gusty north winds. Sustained winds of 20-25 knots with gusts occasionally exceeding 35 knots were currently occurring, but a look up stream shows they should soon calm down to around 15-20 knots with gusts to 25 knots by 06z and after at all airports. Regional radar was noting large- scale ascent increasing mostly along and south of the I-20/30 corridors. Most of this was still -RA, but some mixing with -PL or all over to -PL was starting occur already as far south as KINJ. For DFW Metro airports... Have continued to indicate the strongest north winds this evening, settling down overnight and into Tuesday morning. Any -RA/PL mix should occur after 0130z with surface temps remaining above freezing at least through 03-04z, by which time we would expect a more -PL/SN transition, going over to all -SN before midnight. After 04z is when accums and impacts on tarmacs could start to become problematic as temperatures continue to plummet. Any sleet accumulations will be well under a tenth of an inch, with snow accumulations overnight remaining less than one inch. Low VFR cigs BLO FL035 will fluctuate at times due to precipitation into MVFR AOA 020 through 08z...before going VFR ABV FL040 before 12z Tuesday. Any arrival departure rates tonight and early Tuesday will remain very limited across the northbound semi-circle and cornerposts from Bowie to Bonham. For Waco... Similar trends to DFW, but more likely a slower transition on the precipitation as the airmass behind the cold front starts out much warmer with surface temps currently in the 50s. Transition over to a wintry mix likely won't begin until 03z-05z, so a -RA/PL mix looks likely before 06z, transition to a -SN or -SN/PL mix through 10-11z, before likely seeing more flurries after daybreak Tuesday morning. Though you can't rule out a brief pd of -FZRA around 06z, temperatures still look to hovering around 32-34 degrees and would expect a faster transition to -PL as the atmospheric column cool. Accumulations of sleet should remain tenth of an inch or less, before light snow with accumulations to between 1-2 inches occurs toward 12z Tuesday. 05/ && .SHORT TERM... /Issued 343 PM CST Mon Jan 15 2018/ /Tonight through Tuesday afternoon/ I will preface this discussion by saying that there have been no major changes to the current thinking with regards to the expected winter weather tonight and Tuesday. Therefore, we will continue with the Winter Storm Warning and Winter Weather Advisory and make no changes to duration or area of these products. The Arctic cold front was just north of the I-20 corridor as of 3 PM which is right on schedule. The front will move through the entire region tonight and result in sharply falling temperatures and increasing northerly winds along with development of some light precipitation. The high-res model solutions seem to have the best handle on the current precipitation moving into northern Oklahoma as well as the light showers currently developing across North Texas. However, the HRRR appears a bit too wet with the air at the top of the frontal inversion and therefore generates quite a bit of QPF near and just south of the Red River this evening. We will continue to favor the slightly drier solutions of the TTU WRF and NAM with regards to precipitation tonight as they seem to have the best handle on the dry air moving in on the west side of the upper low. These solutions show scattered light rain developing early this evening with the precipitation slowly transitioning to a wintry mix as the lowest layers of the atmosphere cool below freezing. The period of light freezing rain will be very brief, but since temperatures will be falling quickly, light ice accumulations will be likely. A transition to light sleet and light snow will follow in areas that do see precipitation. Accumulations across the Winter Weather Advisory area will be generally less than 1/2 inch of snow and sleet. Farther south and southeast in the Winter Storm Warning area, moisture will be more available and amounts will be slightly higher, generally between 1/2 and 1 inch with some amounts up to 2 inches across the far eastern zones. The northwest zones that are currently not in an advisory may see some light winter precipitation as well, but right now we feel amounts will be too light for significant impacts. However, we will continue to monitor precipitation trends through the night. The precipitation will end across the northern half of the region overnight, but will linger across the south/southeast zones through mid morning Tuesday before ending Tuesday afternoon. Again, this setup is not one that typically brings large amounts of winter precipitation but with the expected cold temperatures, impacts will be high in areas that see anything. Also, since temperatures are expected to remain below freezing until Wednesday, any slick roads could linger for quite awhile. 79 && .LONG TERM... /Issued 343 PM CST Mon Jan 15 2018/ /Tuesday Night through Sunday/ The main challenge in the long term will be the extreme cold on Tuesday Night into Wednesday morning. Thereafter, a warmup is expected, with temperatures likely above seasonal values by the weekend. Thereafter, there appears to be a chance for showers and a few thunderstorms during the latter half of the weekend. Tuesday Night into Wednesday morning should feature one of the coldest nights thus far in 2018. Skies will gradually clear from north to south with low level winds diminishing as surface high pressure settles in from the northeast. The dry airmass in place will promote ideal radiational cooling. With low temperatures likely bottoming out into the single digits, a "hard freeze" appears likely, mainly for areas near and north of the Highway 380 corridor. The previous configuration of the Hard Freeze Watch looked good, but I went ahead and tacked on a few more counties where snow/sleet cover may further enhance radiational cooling. If RAP/HRRR snow depth outputs of 2" of snow/sleet are correct across more of our East TX counties, it's probable that a few of these counties may be added as well in future forecasts. I also won't rule out some single digit temperatures in the sheltered /low-lying areas south of the current Hard Freeze Watch, but for now will abstain from any wholesale changes as most of these areas are forecast to fall into the teens to low 20s. Freeze Watch/Warning or not, it'll be COLD across all of the area. While winds will be light, the low temperatures even with the lightest of breezes will result in single digit wind chill values on Wednesday morning. During the day, cold conditions will continue across most of North and Central TX as most areas will struggle to climb above 32 degrees. Far western zones may be the beneficiaries of east to southeasterly flow which may limit any additional CAA. Thursday and most Friday look to be quiet weather wise as low level flow finally turns back to the southeast. Most areas should climb above 32 degrees on Thursday in response to the increasing southerly winds. There was concern about a brief chance for winter precipitation down across Central TX, but at this time, it appears that the track of the upper low may be too far south of the area to result in any meaningful lift to overcome what should be a dry airmass. We will keep a close eye on this, but for now, I've pulled the mention of PoPs down here with that reasoning and after coordination with adjacent WFO's. Late Friday into Saturday, there will be a potential for a few light rain showers, mainly across far eastern zones. At this time, I don't have a ton of confidence in the occurrence of this and it's likely that this will be mainly sprinkles/drizzle given that the initial moisture surge will be shallow. The main headline in the extended will be the noticeable warmup after a cold start to the week. High temperatures on Saturday will climb into the upper 60s to 70s as southwest winds yield good adiabatic compression off of the higher terrain to the west. The forecast becomes challenging on Sunday as model solutions diverge with regards to the timing of the next front. The general setup looks to feature a Pacific front/dryline feature that develops to the west and slides eastward. The progression of this feature will be largely dependent on the location of the upper trough. Traditionally, digging upper troughs are not handled well initially by the synoptic models and these features tend to sag farther south than forecast. The ECMWF appears to be one of the slower models with the upper trough and I'll side with it as it pertains to temperatures. Low level moisture will have streamed northward by this time and with strong mid-level flow at 500mb (in excess of 80 knots), there should be some loose-organization to the convective mode along the front. At this time, however, there is still too much uncertainty to advertise any strong to severe weather potential, but we will keep an eye on this in the extended. 24-Bain && .PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS... Dallas-Ft. Worth 19 30 12 31 22 / 40 10 0 0 5 Waco 24 32 12 34 20 / 80 20 0 0 10 Paris 15 27 6 31 18 / 60 5 0 0 5 Denton 16 30 8 32 19 / 30 5 0 0 5 McKinney 18 29 9 32 19 / 40 5 0 0 5 Dallas 19 30 14 31 23 / 40 10 0 0 5 Terrell 20 29 11 33 19 / 60 10 0 0 5 Corsicana 21 30 12 32 21 / 80 20 0 0 5 Temple 24 33 16 35 22 / 80 30 5 0 10 Mineral Wells 17 31 9 34 19 / 30 5 0 0 5 && .FWD WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES... Winter Weather Advisory until noon CST Tuesday for TXZ094-095- 104>106-115>120-129>133-141. Winter Storm Warning until 6 PM CST Tuesday for TXZ107-121>123- 134-135-142>148-156>162-174-175. Hard Freeze Watch from Tuesday evening through Wednesday morning for TXZ091>095-100>107-115>117-123-129. && 05/26
Hazardous Weather Outlook National Weather Service Fort Worth TX 356 PM CST Mon Jan 15 2018 TXZ091>095-100>107-115>123-129>135-141>148-156>162-174-175-161215- Montague-Cooke-Grayson-Fannin-Lamar-Young-Jack-Wise-Denton-Collin- Hunt-Delta-Hopkins-Stephens-Palo Pinto-Parker-Tarrant-Dallas- Rockwall-Kaufman-Van Zandt-Rains-Eastland-Erath-Hood-Somervell- Johnson-Ellis-Henderson-Comanche-Mills-Hamilton-Bosque-Hill-Navarro- Freestone-Anderson-Lampasas-Coryell-Bell-McLennan-Falls-Limestone- Leon-Milam-Robertson- 356 PM CST Mon Jan 15 2018 This Hazardous Weather Outlook is for North and Central Texas. .DAY ONE...Tonight. Wintry precipitation is expected across much of the region tonight through Tuesday morning with light accumulations of snow and ice possible north of a line from Sulphur Springs to Hillsboro to Goldthwaite and accumulations between one half and 2 inches possible south of this line. Since temperatures are expected to fall well below freezing tonight, hazardous travel conditions are expected. .DAYS TWO THROUGH SEVEN...Tuesday through Sunday. Light snow will end from northwest to southeast Tuesday. Road conditions will likely not improve until midday Wednesday when temperatures climb above freezing and ice or snow on roads begins to slowly melt. A hard freeze is expected generally north of the Interstate 20 corridor Tuesday night through sunrise Wednesday with temperatures falling into the single digits. There is a chance of thunderstorms area wide Sunday and Sunday night. .SPOTTER INFORMATION STATEMENT... Spotter activation is not expected at this time, but reports of wintry precipitation and impacts are appreciated.
The national radar mosaic for the moment the first event began.
8 winter weather, 1 winter storm, 1 extreme cold/wind chill. Local standard time, as filed.
Slick bridges and overpasses were reported in parts of Dallas County where trace amounts of sleet and snow fell.
Emergency management reported slick roadways across the county due to about a tenth of an inch of sleet and snow.
Kaufman County Sheriff's Department reported that most FM roads were slick from snow, but the main roads were okay.
Amateur radio reported that ice was accumulating on US Highway 79 between the cities of Jewett and Buffalo.
Department of Highways reported patchy ice on bridges and overpasses due to light snow accumulations.
Department of Highways discouraged travel on Interstate 45 due to icy conditions.
Emergency management reported that Interstate 45 was shut down due to icy conditions resulting from half an inch of snow.
Several accidents were reported along Interstate 20 in Van Zandt County, near the city of Canton. Two to 3 inches of snow were reported in the county, as most roads were covered in a glaze of ice and snow.
A social media report indicated icy roads and snow accumulations around half an inch in the city of Eustace.
Two homeless people were found dead in the city of Dallas. One woman was found at a light rail station, while a man was found in a city park.
As the offices recorded each death: direct deaths were caused by the weather itself, indirect ones by something it set in motion.
| Event | Date | Age | Sex | Where | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Extreme Cold/Wind Chill, Dallas | 2018-01-17 | 69 | Male | Outside/Open Areas | Direct |
| Extreme Cold/Wind Chill, Dallas | 2018-01-17 | 57 | Female | Outside/Open Areas | Direct |
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
Every storm in Texas in 2018Every state in 2018This day in weather historyWarnings in Texas, January 2018
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, compiled from the National Weather Service’s monthly Storm Data. Complete through 2026-06; NCEI adds each month about 75 days after it ends and revises past years a few times a year. Rebuilt 2026-09-24. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 735293, 735294, 735492, 735493, 735494, 735495, 735497, 727487, 735496, 727488.