Snow, Ice Returning To Recovering Midwest Freight Markets

There's no rest for the weary as another winter storm may slow down Midwest freight movement just a bit in the coming days. The good news is this storm won't be as harsh as the one last weekend. Also, snowstorms are coming back to the Pacific Northwest this week after a short break the past few days. The first burst of snowfall in the region is happening today.

Preamble

A slow-moving system will produce snowfall today in the mountains of eastern Utah and western Colorado, as well as western and northern New Mexico. In most areas, accumulations will be light. The highest amounts of 6 to 12 inches will hit the mountains of northeastern Arizona and northern New Mexico. This will result in moderate impacts on I-40 in New Mexico, from Grants to Gallup.

Main Event

Tomorrow, the Southwest system will produce snow and freezing in eastern Oklahoma, western Arkansas, eastern Kansas, eastern Nebraska, northern Missouri and Iowa. Then it will spread into northern Illinois and Wisconsin tomorrow night, continuing across the Midwest on Thursday, possibly lingering into Friday.

Left: SONAR ticker OTRIW. Right: SONAR Critical Events, Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2020. Midwest-Great Lakes winter storm threat.

Fortunately, this is not forecast to be the kind of situation that would cause interstates to shut down for long periods of time. This is good news! The latest FreightWaves SONAR data, updated this morning, shows increasing capacity in several Midwest freight markets. Carriers have been sending trucks back to these areas after last weekend's storm. This is indicated on the map above by the dark red areas in Minnesota and Wisconsin, representing decreases in outbound tender rejections in the past week (OTRIW). This means carriers have been accepting more loads from these markets since the storm cleared.