Forecast of the Day • A National Weather Forecasting Contest

As a strong low pressure center forms today and moves across the Great Plains, some locations such as Pierre, South Dakota (Motto: "On the River -- On the Move") could see an impressive April snowfall. Let's predict the 24-hr precipitation amount (melted equivalent) and see what happens.

Question: The current NWS discussion for Pierre includes this: "Fresh new widespread deep snowpack over the region, even in April, will likely take more than one day to melt off. Then, low level waa starts to ramp up for Tuesday and Wednesday, but while warmth is being given over to melting snow, temperatures probably won`t be "near climo normal" on Tuesday and maybe not even Wednesday." Why would melting snow affect the daytime temperatures?