Wet and white, but snow wasn't too wild and won't be here long

If your spirits sank when you saw the flakes flying Monday, buck up: It's going to be gone soon. But not before another round of white-knuckled commuting today.

"It'll probably be one of those deals where it's best to leave home 15 to 20 minutes earlier," meteorologist Tony Zaleski of the National Weather Service in Chanhassen said Monday night.

Forecasters expected a total of 6 to 8 inches to pile up around the metro area by this morning, when overnight temperatures in the 20s will result in a veneer of ice in many areas, particularly rural and secondary roads.

But the good news is that high temperatures near 35 today should bring a partial snow retreat, and extra sunshine Wednesday with temperatures about 45 should melt off most of the lingering mess, Zaleski said.

The Monday snowfall made March the second-snowiest month of the winter. The total of 18 inches was a mere one-tenth of an inch short of what fell in December, this winter's snowiest month. A slight dusting after midnight brought the seasonal total to 43.7 inches, nearly a foot short of the normal.

In fact, out of the past five winters, only 2003-04 had the usual amount of snow, when 66.3 inches piled on the Twin Cities, said Mark Seeley, a University of Minnesota extension climatologist.

"We migrated through the majority of the winter with an extremely paltry amount of seasonal snowfall, at least here in the Twin Cities. Now it appears we're catching up," Seeley said Monday.

Fans arriving at the Metrodome Monday for the Minnesota Twins season opener, found about 4.8 inches of snow already on the ground, with about 2.8 of that having fallen since noon.

For an exercise in counting your blessings, you can think back to March 31, 1985, when we got 14.7 inches, or about twice what fell Monday. And while we were likely to double the March average of 10.4 inches with Monday's snowstorm, the record is 40 inches, which fell in 1951.

Looking ahead, National Weather Service meteorologist Karen Trammell says that when the weekend warm-up arrives, we can count on more springlike weather. For about three days.

"It's too soon to say whether we're going to have another downturn," she said. "We'll have three or four days, at least, where the temp is going to feel more like normal spring."

Early spring snow is different than early or mid-winter snow, Trammell said. Because of the higher temperatures, there's more water content, which makes the snow heavier and harder to shovel.

There were a handful of snow-related accidents outstate Monday, including one fatality and one serious injury. An unidentified person died in Rock County, in southwestern Minnesota, after the driver of a vehicle slid on an icy roadway, striking another car head-on.

Peterson said troopers were well-staffed for the commute home Monday and will remain watchful for this morning's commute. Though crashes were above average Monday night, there weren't an unusual number given the blustery weather, officials said.

Peterson said that overnight troopers' shifts will be extended or daytime troopers will report early if the conditions warrant it.

"We will let the weather and the day itself dictate what happens," he said.

Seeley holds a mixed view on Monday's snowfall.

"For the scientist side of me, it's significant," he said. "... But the citizen side of me, I'm fed up, I'm all the way up to my neck with winter."

Mitch Anderson is a University of Minnesota student reporter on assignment for the Star Tribune. mbaca@startribune.com • 612-673-4409 asimons@startribune.com • 612-673-4921