Short Range Forecast Discussion NWS Weather Prediction Center College Park MD 249 PM EST Wed Dec 05 2018 Valid 00Z Thu Dec 06 2018 - 00Z Sat Dec 08 2018 ...Storm system to bring rain and mountain snow to California Wednesday and Thursday... ...A developing winter storm may bring accumulating ice and snow to the Southern Rockies and Southern Plains by Friday... ...Heavy rainfall will start toward Friday evening across Central Texas... Scattered precipitation will continue in California, especially southern California, through Thursday. Although the rain will not be particularly heavy, minor debris flows or mudslides are still a concern near recent burn scars in southern California. Snow is also expected in the higher elevations of the Sierra Nevada range and above six thousand feet elevation in the mountains near Los Angeles. This same weather system will spread low elevation rain and high elevation snow showers into the Southwest and southern Great Basin on Thursday as well. East of the Rockies, a surface high pressure dominates the southeastern states maintaining a quiescent pattern through the remainder of the work week. A second strong high will spill out of the northern Rockies and usher in a surge of cold air through the Central High Plains leading to afternoon high temperatures to be between 10 to 20 degrees below average, particularly across Western Oklahoma and the Texas Panhandle. This cold outbreak will set the stage for an increasing winter weather threat as the West Coast storm crosses out of the Southwest with a solid moisture plume in advance of it, starting off as freezing rain by early Friday slowly transitioning to accumulating snow from eastern New Mexico to central Oklahoma. The deep moisture plume along with increasing southerly flow off the western Gulf of Mexico will be highly focused in producing prolonged moderate to heavy rainfall occasionally heavy at times. By Friday evening the rainfall will become steady and heavy enough to start the threat of flooding in central and southeast Texas, perhaps with an embedded flash flooding threat too, though it grows greater overnight into Saturday. Gallina/Burke Graphics available at www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/basicwx/basicwx_ndfd.php