BILLINGS — Billings is right on the edge of the activity Thursday. To the east, we have partly cloudy skies. To the west, we have mostly cloudy skies and a few showers. However, in downtown Billings in the afternoon, we are at 47 degrees with partly cloudy skies and a north wind at 16 mph gusting to 22.
Around the rest of the state, our temps are mostly into the 30s, 40s and one place, Helena, is already into the 50s.
We do have a Winter Storm Watch, which goes in effect for the mountains at 6 p.m. Friday and lasts until 6 p.m. Saturday for 3 to 6 inches of snow, below the 5,000-foot level, and six inches or more, above the 5,000-foot level.
Plus, we have a High Wind Watch for Friday for winds gusting to 60 mph in Wheatland and Sweet Grass counties.
The Doppler radar shows light rain and snow showers caught up in a northwesterly flow of air, basically just west of Billings. It's close enough to Billings we could see a few scattered rain showers to the west and partly cloudy skies to the east.
The high-resolution forecast model shows those slight showers continue to move out of the area Thursday night, and we will be left with mostly sunny skies in the morning. However, that afternoon the clouds roll back in and so does a chance of rain after 10:30 p.m.
By Saturday morning, the rain will change over to snow and then more snow is expected late Saturday into Sunday.
Snowfall could be about 1 to 2 inches and mostly on the grassy areas this weekend in Billings.
It will be 45 degrees at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, then we cool back down to the 30s in the morning and back up to 53 degrees by 12:30 p.m. Friday.
We will top out at 61 on Friday, then cool back down to the 30s over the weekend and get back into the 40s, by the middle part of next week.
BILLINGS FORECAST
TONIGHT: Partly cloudy and cold. West winds 5 to 15 mph. Low 31 degrees.
FRIDAY: Mostly cloudy with a 20% chance for afternoon rain and warmer. Southwest winds 10 to 20 mph. High 61 degrees.
SATURDAY: Mostly cloudy with a 90% chance for rain and snow in the morning, then snow late in the morning and the afternoon and much colder. Snow accumulations are possible. North winds 10 to 20 mph. High 35 degrees.
