School Closing Outlook for Monday 02/23/2026

Day 1 School Closing Outlook

www.WestMichiganWeather.net/closings

Forecast Valid: Monday, February 23, 2026

Forecast Issued: Sunday, February 22, 2026, 8:50 PM

Forecasters: Jacob Melton

NOTE:

We apologize for the late issuance of this outlook. Personal matters prevented us from getting this outlook published by our normal 5:00 PM release time for supporters and 7:00 PM for the public.

Summary:

Some school closures or delays will be possible on Monday morning across portions of our area due to continued impacts from lake effect snow.

Discussion:

Snow has been falling across the area throughout the day. While it either already has or will continue to taper off this evening for our inland locations, there are two areas of focus that we have highlighted due to continued impacts from lake-effect snow. One is across our northwestern areas, and the other is across some of our southwestern zones.

The first area, and our area with the greatest potential for school closures/delays, is in our southwestern zones. In particular, our focus is on and around Berrien County, which is likely to see the most additional snow into tomorrow, with 2-5” of additional new snow forecast through the early afternoon hours of tomorrow. Gusty winds of up to 35 MPH will also contribute to some blowing snow issues, which may further contribute to poor road conditions for the morning commute tomorrow.

For these reasons, we have placed a “Medium” risk zone across Berrien County and the immediate surrounding areas. A limited risk has been placed surrounding this, covering the western parts of Allegan, Van Buren, and Cass counties. Additional snow accumulations will be lower on the order of 1-3”, but that may still contribute to poor road conditions resulting in isolated closures or delays. A Minuscule risk zone extends from roughly Holland to Allegan to Three Rivers, as additional new snow accumulation should remain an inch or less, but poor secondary road conditions may contribute to an isolated closure or two.

As for our northwestern areas, we have opted to place a Limited risk zone to cover areas northwest of the Whitehall to Baldwin line. Additional lake effect snow will be on the lower end and more localized, with the potential for 1-3” of new snow through tomorrow morning, mainly confined to western portions of Mason and Oceana counties. However, Baldwin Community Schools had already announced their closure for tomorrow due to poor road conditions, meaning that secondary road conditions may influence closures in these areas as well. A Minuscule risk surrounds the Limited risk in this area, where new snow will be very minimal, and school closures are relatively unlikely but cannot be fully ruled out due to secondary road conditions.

Confidence in this forecast is Medium, mainly in part due to this being lake-effect snow, which can be very sensitive to even minor changes in wind direction that may not be picked up by computer models.

Graphical Forecast: