Short Range Forecast Discussion NWS Weather Prediction Center College Park MD 356 PM EST Sat Jan 31 2015 Valid 00Z Sun Feb 01 2015 - 00Z Tue Feb 03 2015 ...Impacts will be significant and widespread with a winter storm spinning up over the central U.S. this weekend... The stage will be set for a widespread precipitation event across the central and eastern U.S. this weekend as Arctic air plunging out of Canada clashes with warm and moist air lifting out of the Gulf of Mexico. A surface low spinning up in the Middle Mississippi Valley Saturday night will help focus organized areas of precipitation as it tracks through the Ohio Valley Sunday and into the northern Mid-Atlantic region on Monday. An axis of moderate to heavy snows will develop to the north of frontal boundary extending eastward from the low...resulting a wide swath of accumulating snows extending from Nebraska all the way to southern New England. Just to the south of the snow axis...marginal temperatures could lead to a transition zone of sleet and freezing rain. Farther south...a cold front trailing from the deepening surface low will trigger heavy rains and a few thunderstorms while it drops through the southern Plains and pushes from the Lower Mississippi Valley to the Southeast. Elsewhere across the Nation...strong winds and heavy snows across Maine will continue to diminish as a deep coastal low offshore lifts into the Canadian Maritimes. A weak cold front approaching the West Coast will increase rain and snow chances for the Pacific Northwest and northern Rockies on Sunday. Meanwhile...the heavy precipitation event in the Southwest will continue to wind down as an upper trough edges out of the region and the moisture supply gets shut off. Gerhardt Graphics available at www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/basicwx/basicwx_wbg.php