What Will Winter Be Like in South Dakota, Minnesota, and Iowa?

Unofficially, there are three basic kinds of winter in the upper midwest. Normal Winter where it seems like there is snow around most of the time, it occasionally gets below zero, and we have a nasty storm or two. Then there's Missouri winter where we get snow but it stays warm most of the time so it melts right away. And then there's 2018 Winter where it gets brutally cold and we have as many blizzards as we do school holidays.

Which winter will we get this year?

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration released its predictions of what the winter of 2021-2022 will be like and it seems like they will be mostly vanilla.

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All of South Dakota, Nebraska, along with most of Iowa and Minnesota are in the normal range for precipitation. That means we won't be able to walk onto our roofs from the snow piling up. Most of eastern Iowa and small sections of Minnesota are expected to get higher than average snow and rain.

Temperatures will be more varied in our four states than precipitation. NOAA expects eastern South Dakota, and most of Nebraska, Iowa, and Minnesota to have normal highs and lows. Central and western South Dakota is expected to have a colder than average winter while eastern Iowa will be warmer than a normal winter.

As we all know, these predictions could be completely wrong. That's okay for most of us. For those who are newer to the region from a warmer place, just don't put the snow gear away until June and you'll be fine.