A Major Winter Storm Is Looking More & More Likely For Sunday Through Monday Across Western & Central Mass (Issued: Thursday Afternoon 1/22/2026)

For Tonight: Generally partly cloudy skies are expected throughout tonight. Low temperatures will be between 15 and 20 Degrees. Winds will be West at 10 to 20 mph.

Friday Through Saturday: An Arctic cold front is expected to push through the region during Friday afternoon. It still looks like this will be a “dry front” and because of this, no snow shower activity is expected with its passage. Dangerously cold temperatures are expected to then invade the entire area during Friday night and Saturday. In fact, the Arctic air mass will bring some of the coldest temperatures we’ve seen in at least the last couple of years during Friday night, Saturday and Saturday night.

Friday looks to feature partly sunny skies to start the day, but varying amounts of clouds can be expected during the late morning and afternoon hours. High temperatures will be between 25 and 30 Degrees. Winds will be West at 15 to 25 mph with gusts to 35 mph.

Friday night looks to feature partly cloudy skies during the before midnight hours and clear skies during the after midnight hours. Dangerously cold wind chill temperatures are expected throughout Friday night. Low temperatures will be between 5 below zero and 10 below zero. Winds will be West to Northwest at 15 to 20 mph with gusts to 30 mph. Wind chill temperatures on Friday night will be between 20 and 30 below zero.

Saturday looks sunny and very cold with high temperatures between 5 and 10 Degrees. Winds will be West to Northwest at 10 to 20 mph with gusts to 30 mph. Wind chill temperatures on Saturday will be in the 15 to 25 below zero range in the morning and around 10 below zero in the afternoon.

Saturday night looks partly cloudy with low temperatures between 5 below zero and 10 below zero. Winds will be North to Northwest at around 10 mph.

A Major Winter Storm Is Looking More & More Likely For Sunday Through Monday: So, are we getting a snowstorm on Sunday through Monday? YES!!! How big of a snowstorm it’ll be is yet to be determined.

All of the signals are now pointing towards the likelihood of a potentially high impact winter storm that impacts all of Western and Central Mass during Sunday, Sunday night and even through a large part of Monday.

All of the latest weather forecast guidance are forecasting AT LEAST 6 to 12 inches of snow accumulation with this storm. In fact, there are some models that are strongly pointing towards well over a foot of snow to accumulate across a large part of the area.

One thing that is very evident is that all the ingredients seem to be there to support a major snowstorm across the entire area. This includes:

- A low pressure system that will track near or just east of Nantucket by Sunday night into Monday.

- Plenty of moisture and energy being pushed northward into Southern New England.

- An Arctic air mass will produce a very light, fluffy and powdery snow that will have no problems accumulating quickly.

- Strong forcing pushing into the region leading to at least several hours of heavy to very heavy snow with snow rates of at least 1 to 2 inches per hour possible.

Here Are My Thoughts: While I think there is more than enough evidence in the data to support a major winter storm impacting Western and Central Mass from Sunday through Monday, I’m not yet ready to pull out all of the stops & go crazy with snow total forecasts. That being said, widespread snow totals of well over a foot to possibly as much as 18 inches is quite possible.

For now though, I do think that we’ll see snow overspread all of Western and Central Mass during the mid and late morning hours of Sunday. The snow is then expected to continue through all of Sunday afternoon, all of Sunday night and probably all day Monday.

There is likely to be a period of heavy to very heavy snow with snow rates of at least 1 to 2 inches per hour throughout Sunday afternoon and Sunday evening. Should this occur, travel during Sunday afternoon and Sunday evening would be extremely difficult due to rapid accumulation of snow on roads, very low visibility and extremely hazardous travel conditions.

Current indications seem to point towards the snow continuing through all day Monday and not ending until sometime late Monday afternoon or Monday evening.

The ceiling in terms of potential snow accumulations for this storm is very high. The reason why is because the Arctic air mass will be able to produce a very light, fluffy and powdery snow that has no problems at all adding up quickly.

My first snowfall forecast map for this storm is attached to this post. I want to caution you that these forecast snow totals will very probably need to be increased in future forecasts as more high-resolution weather data arrives.

My recommendation to you is that you need to be planning for a lot of snow with potential accumulations of over a foot likely for Sunday, Sunday night and Monday. This will most definitely impact any plans that you may have on Sunday, Sunday night and Monday.

Additionally, this is going to be a very cold storm. Temperatures on Sunday will only be between 10 and 15 Degrees. Temperatures on Sunday night will be between 5 and 10 Degrees and temperatures on Monday will rise to only 15 to 20 Degrees.

Finally, it appears that the winds shouldn’t be that strong with this storm & because of this, blizzard conditions ARE NOT expected. In fact, any blowing and drifting snow should be fairly minimal. Overall, I’m expecting wind speeds to be around 10 mph on Sunday, between 10 and 15 mph on Sunday night and between 10 and 15 mph on Monday.

It goes without saying that I continue to keep extremely close tabs on the progress of this winter storm. So, keep checking back for the latest updates!! I'M ASKING FOR YOUR HELP IN SUPPORTING COSTS TO OPERATE ROUTE 20 WEATHER: First, I’d like to thank everyone once again for your continued support. If it were not for you, I would not be able to do a job that I love so very much – forecasting the weather for Western and Central Mass.

I’m reaching out to you to ask if you would help us out in alleviate the costs required for producing these weather forecasts for Western and Central Mass.

I do not get paid for the weather forecasts and the weather updates that I post on the Route 20 Weather website or on this Facebook page. It’s completely a public service to help out this area of the state which is vastly under served when it comes to weather coverage.

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