We are enjoying a beautiful day here in New England, even with the frigid start. Many locations were well below zero this morning, but a warmer air mass is moving in and temperatures have already climbed into the 20s and 30s in many locations. The combination of this "warmth" and bright sunshine will aid in some minor melting today, mainly on dark surfaces. This should also help with a bit of compaction of the snow, where its not already beaten down from plows, snowblowers and shoveling.
The pleasant conditions will continue tonight and into the first half of Saturday. I expect to see a few hours of sunshine on Saturday morning before some high clouds move in late morning. Gradually the clouds will thicken and lower as the storm system coming out of the Southeastern United States races northeastward.
I don't have much confidence in what I'm seeing in the forecast models this morning. They continue to give a wide range of solutions and they didn't initialize well. This means that with the first few hours of the forecast period, the model was already deviating from what was actually happening. The one model that did a decent job with the first few hours of the forecast is the one that I didn't want to see. This model gives New England the most amount of precipitation.
All that being said, I'll get into the forecast.
Areas south of Concord, NH should get warm enough to see any precipitation that arrives before 6 PM fall in the form of rain or a rain/snow mix. As temperatures start to cool down, a change over to sleet is expected for a couple of hours before changing over to strictly snow. This system will also be moving pretty quickly as it gets further north in latitude. The mix of liquid in with the snow and the speed of the system will keep the amount of accumulating snow down some, but it will still likely be enough to need to be plowed, shoveled or snowblown.
So totals:
North of Concord, NH, where it will be mainly snow: 4-8 inches. This range should extend into the White Mountains and most of Central Maine.
Between Concord, NH and I-495 in MA: 2-5 inches. I expect higher amounts the closer you are to Concord. This is where the rain/snow/mix line will linger on Saturday late afternoon into the evening before the change over to all snow occurs. This changeover should happen sometime between 6 and 9 PM.
South of I-495: This will likely be a mainly rain event with some mixing as the precipitation begins to taper off. 1 to 2 inches possible.
South of Boston will be an all rain event, most of the precipitation will be in Central and Northern New Hampshire with this event so any precipitation in this area will be short-lived.
One of the major concerns that everyone needs to be worried about is the weight of the snow on your roof. Adding rain to this will only make that snow pack heavier. If you haven't reduced the amount of snow on your roof already, I would highly reccommend doing this as soon as possible.
If we look even further out, we should have another busy week next week. Look for the possibility of another storm on Monday or Tuesday. There has been a lot of model deviation with this system. Too soon to tell if it will hit New England or not.
I'm more concerned with what I'm seeing for the second half of next week. Most of the longer range models have been hinting at another big storm. This one will likely be a mess as it should include some mixed precipitation and there could be an extensive area of freezing rain. Still way to far out to get into specifics. I'll have more as it gets closer.
Questions/comments are welcome below.
I'll update as necessary, probably a brief update this evening.
Thanks for reading!
-Jon K.
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