It’s looking like winter will hit Mount Hood Sunday, December 1.

Forecasters are predicting rain turning to snow this weekend, with serious snowfall and extreme winds beginning Sunday afternoon and lasting through Monday.

Temira Lital, who writes snow reports for Mt. Hood Meadows and a lively blog for windsurfers, bicyclists, skiers and snowboarders, is predicting winds as high as 90 miles an hour high up on Mount Hood as the storm peaks.

This time the snow should last. A blast of Arctic air is expected to bring the freezing level down and could result in some record-breaking low temperatures.

A special weather statement from the National Weather Service issued Friday, November 29 at 5:40 am predicts “very cold air” next week with wind chills near or below zero at times.

The weather-model website snow-forecast.com is predicting the freezing level on Mount Hood to drop from 9,000 feet Sunday afternoon to 2500 feet Monday and zero feet Tuesday. Snow in Portland is a possibility.

This all comes as welcome news for Mount Hood resorts, which have seen previous snow gains wiped out by rain and high temps. 76 inches of snow have fallen at Timberline Lodge since September 1, but the base depth as of Friday morning is just 21 inches and bare spots exist. The base at Meadows is 18 inches, and at Skibowl there is hardly any snow on the hill at all, with a listed base of 0-6 inches.

Timberline has been open on weekends for a month and a half and recently transitioned to seven days a week, thanks to the reserves of snow at 8500 feet on Palmer Snowfield. But next week’s cold air should enable Skibowl and Meadows to catch up by cranking up their snow-making operations and building up the base at key locations. Skibowl managed to make enough snow to open its tubing hill for Thanksgiving weekend, and early December skiing and snowboarding at Skibowl is looking much more likely than it did a week ago.

Follow Shred Hood on Twitter for real-time updates as the storm moves in and hits.

Last modified: November 29, 2013