A blast of cold is going to hit Michigan this week. The cold won't be like anything already experienced this winter. This cold will be more severe, last longer and focus heavy lake effect in a different area.

Most of the heavy lake effect this winter has come on a northwest wind. The lake effect this week will be brought by a more northerly wind. So the lake effect will fall closer to the Lake Michigan shoreline. The heaviest snow will likely fall in the far southwest corner of Lower Michigan from St. Joseph to Michigan City, IN and South Bend, IN. Also heavy lake effect should fall from Traverse City, Leelanau County and southward to just west of Cadillac.

The heaviest areas of lake effect snow should easily have 6" of snow, with spots getting up to a foot of snow.

Travel Tip: If you have to drive to Chicago, taking I-80/I-90 will probably have a shorter stretch of heavy snow than I-94.

Of course with this kind of cold, the Upper Peninsula snow belts will have plenty of snow.

The rest of Michigan will have only 1" to 3" of total snow this week. The farther south and east, the lighter the snow will be.

No area will escape the deep cold. This cold snap won't be like the other cold snaps this winter that only lasted a few days. This cold snap will start Tuesday and gradually get colder each day into next weekend.

By the time temperatures bottom out this weekend, we'll freeze with highs in the teens and low temperatures in the single digits above or below zero.

The wind will push wind chill temperatures down to -10deg to -20deg at times in the second half of the week.

For those of you hoping this cold doesn't last into March, the eight to 14 day forecast calls for a warmup.

I will say one thing. For the health of Michigan's fruit crop, staying cold into March would be the best weather. If we get warm too early, fruit blossoms too early and likely would get frozen.

If you have any weather questions, please ask below.

MLive Chief Meteorologist Mark Torregrossa has been forecasting Michigan weather for more than 25 years. He's been chief meteorologist at three television news stations in Michigan, and he's an avid gardener and hunter. Email him at mtorregr@mlive.com and find him on Facebook at facebook.com/mark.torregrossa and Twitter @weathermanmark