Bad news: a white Christmas is NOT happening

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- Yes, there's a chance of a little accumulating snow over the next few days, but whatever winds up falling will be history well before Christmas arrives.

But what about any additional snow chances leading up to Santa's arrival Christmas morning? 

Unfortunately there aren't many, if any at all.

We'll get to our 2019 white Christmas outlook here in just a moment, but let's start with the historical probability of Michiana seeing a white Christmas.

The map above shows the probability of at least 1" of snow being on the ground on Christmas Day.

It uses climate data from the period 1981-2010 to obtain the average probability of a white Christmas in the form of a percentage. 

For Michiana, most of us fall in the 40-60% chance based on this method. In other words, we see an official white Christmas roughly half of the time. 

So will we see a white Christmas this year? That's the question everyone wants answered. And despite the big day still being 10 days away, we can accurately answer it already.

The pattern leading up to Christmas will be anything but supportive of snowfall across the Great Lakes, Ohio Valley and Midwest. There's a very good chance of above normal temperatures in the upper 30s and lower 40s here in Michiana each day beginning Thursday the 19th. 

That, of course, doesn't bode well for snow because we need subfreezing temperatures. That looks highly unlikely.

Not only that, but there's pretty solid support from forecast models for a dry and tranquil weather pattern leading up to Christmas Day. 

It's very possible we don't see much, if any, rain or snow between December 17th and 24th. And even if we were to see a chance of precipitation arise, temperatures will be too warm for it to fall as snow.

So this all points to a very, very bleak outlook for a white Christmas here in Michiana. Our official forecast is calling for virtually a 0% chance of there being a white Christmas this year.

That's probably not what you wanted to hear, but there really isn't anything suggesting even a tiny chance of snow in the week leading up to Christmas. 

There's always 2020, right?!