Now we turn our attention to the next storm, due to arrive tomorrow. For once during this pattern, it looks pretty much like a non event. After a beautiful day today, clouds will begin to increase overnight and will thicken and lower tomorrow (Thursday) morning. Very light snow or flurries should begin during the late morning or around noon and continue for most of the afternoon as long as the storm track remains to our south. Snow will end Thursday night after an accumulation of nothing more than an inch or so at the most, and some areas will receive only a coating. Friday will be partly cloudy and cold, with a brisk northwest wind. Temperatures will be in the low 20s and fall to near zero early Saturday morning.
It is the next system that I am becoming worried about. Earlier that disturbance looked to be passing out to sea to our south, a close call, but no cigar. Now there are signals that it will be guided closer to us by a somewhat different orientation of the east coast trough. It now looks like the system will emerge off the east coast just a bit south of New York City, where it will latch on to Atlantic Ocean moisture and begin to rapidly intensify. From this position it will likely move to the east northeast then to the northeast, passing near or just west of the benchmark. Should this scenario play out as described, southern New England would be on the receiving end of yet another disruptive and possibly crippling snow storm which would be a disaster for much of this area. Snow would begin early Saturday night, becoming moderate to heavy during the night and continue well into Sunday before tapering off and ending sometime late Sunday afternoon. Winds would increase from the northeast to 15 to 25 mph over inland areas with gusts to 40 mph and to 30 to 40 mph along the coast, the Cape and Islands with gusts to 55 mph. Temperatures would likely be held in the teens and low twenties which would bring the “fluff” factor into play once again, as the snow to liquid ratios would be between 15 and 20 to 1 in most locations. Powdery snow, low temperatures and strong winds are a recipe for a lot of drifting and blowing snow, which will contribute to making travel nearly impossible during the height of the storm. The bottom line here is that should this work out the way I think it will, we have the potential for another serious storm across much of southern New England, one that could bring us from 8 to 12 inches of snow by Sunday night with cold temperatures, strong winds and a lot of drifting and blowing snow. However, this storm is nearly 5 days away and there are a lot of details yet to be worked out.
Following this storm, more arctic air will come in on strong northwest winds. With the pressure gradient setting up the way it looks for the storm and immediately after, this will be a considerably windier storm and aftermath than we have seen in past storms. Wind chill values could fall to dangerously low levels and the National Weather Service may issue headlines regarding the wind chill values.
Of course, this would exacerbate roof loading problems and make driving even more of a challenge due to the increasing heights of snow banks lowering visibility, particularly at corners.
I will watch this closely and have another weekend storm update tomorrow. Did I mention that there is another storm coming along about Tuesday of next week?
