So Phil saw his shadow this morning, and predicts 6 more weeks of winter huh? We’ll, if you want to spin it positively, his track record is not all that great. Look at last year’s call for an early Spring. After that bold prediction, we still had another 5-6 FEET of snow fall through much of southern New England. However, with that said, I tend to agree with him this go around as the pattern looks active across the country for the month of February. For us, the next disruptive storm is on Wednesday.
Until then, let’s enjoy the 50 degree weather today, shall we? It comes with mostly cloudy skies, but limited precipitation as just a passing sprinkle or brief shower runs on through along an afternoon cold front. On the other side of that front, cooler weather works in tonight.
As a wave of low pressure rides along that front, that stalls just south of us for Monday, it’ll spread snow across the south coast of New England Monday morning. Enough moisture sneaks far enough to spit out some flakes as far north as the Mass Pike, but at this point, I don’t see much more than flurries from Boston to Worcester, if that. Across the South Shore, a coating is a better bet with a good 1-2″ across Buzzards Bay and the Cape and Islands with the higher numbers favoring the farther south you go. Behind this system, we’re quiet for Tuesday and seasonably cold.
The main event this work-week is Wednesday. As an area of low pressure moves from Texas to the Ohio Valley, it grabs Gulf of Mexico Moisture and heads northeast. As that moisture encounters that colder air in place, the northern side of the storm is snow. Initially, the main area of low pressure looks to move from the Ohio Valley to PA and head toward New York. If that inland track continued, we’d see snow go to an icy mix, if not over to rain with an east to southeast wind developing. However, there also appears that a secondary low starts to take over south of us, and as that becomes the main storm, the colder air has more staying power and the mix/rain line stays farther south thanks to a more northeast wind. Right now a plowable snow looks likely for most locations, with the exception of far southeast Mass. Where it stays all snow, there’s enough moisture for a good 6-10″ with the bulk of it falling Wednesday morning through early afternoon. It’s too early to draw the pin point snow maps, but as of now the most likely locations for all snow is along and north of the Pike. Of course, a change in the track changes that, and that’s what we’ll have to fine tune here over the next few days to adjust either north or south.
Next storm up after this one may be slated sometime next weekend (perhaps late Saturday or Sunday). We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it. For now though, it appears that Phil is on the right track this go around.
Enjoy your Sunday and eat all the buffalo chicken dip, wings, pizza you can tonight. I know I will.
On twitter – @clamberton7