Well….the brutally cold winter has been trending as that jet stream has been locked in a cold position for a few months now. This jet stream has delivered yet another chunk of arctic air into New England overnight and that sets us up for a bitterly cold day as we close the books on meteorological winter (December 1st-February 28th..3 coldest months of the year).
Thankfully as we work into the weekend, the trend will be upward in the temperature department as daytime highs jump nearly 10-15 degrees on Saturday when compared to today. That will put most towns into the low/mid 30s by afternoon with much less wind, making it a decent day for the slopes, XC trails or your fav hill for sledding. Sunday sees the temp trend up a couple of more degrees with afternoon highs near 40…close to normal for this time of year! Skies will average mostly cloudy.
The other developing trend is the track of our Monday Storm. This trend has been a southward shift in the storm track and a golden rule in Meteorology is Trend is Your Friend. The reason for the southward shift is actually another arctic front expected to drop out of Canada Sunday night. This should be able to deflect most of the heavy snow south of New England. i say most because I do think the potential is there for 3-6″ of snow from Plymouth to Attleboro and everyone south during the day Monday. Farther north, I would plan on 1-3″ of snow for metro Boston out toward Worcester and possibly only a coating north of Rt. 2.
Of course, another rule in meteorology is that Trends Reverse Themselves so stay tuned this weekend on the track of the storm. In any event, cold weather is here for the start of next week but there are signs of warming late next week & beyond.
~JR