A Mix Of Snow, Sleet & Freezing Rain Looks Likely Wednesday Night Into Thursday Morning

For Tonight: Clear skies are expected tonight after some late afternoon and early evening lingering clouds. Low temperatures will be between 10 and 15 Degrees. Winds will be West at 5 to 10 mph.

Tuesday: Skies will start out partly sunny during Tuesday morning, but will become cloudy during the afternoon as a low pressure system tracks across the Mid-Atlantic states.

High temperatures will be between 30 and 35 Degrees. Winds will be West to Southwest at 10 to 15 mph.

Tuesday Night & Wednesday: An area of low pressure tracking off of the Mid-Atlantic coast on Tuesday night is expected to remain well to the south of our area. This means that all of the snow accompanying this storm system will miss our area. Current indications seem to point towards the northern edge of the snow to make it as far north as central and southern Connecticut, southern Rhode Island and the Cape during Tuesday night.

Tuesday night will be cloudy with low temperatures between 15 and 20 Degrees. Winds will be Southwest at 5 to 10 mph before midnight and North at 5 to 10 mph after midnight.

Wednesday looks cloudy with high temperatures between 25 and 30 Degrees. Winds will be Northeast at 5 to 10 mph.

A Mix Of Snow, Sleet & Freezing Rain Is Expected On Wednesday Night Into Thursday Morning: An area of low pressure is expected to cross New England during the late night hours of Wednesday night into Thursday morning. It is looking likely that this storm will bring with it a messy mixture of snow to start with on Wednesday night that changes to freezing rain and sleet by Thursday morning.

There are going to be a couple of things that will need to be monitored with this storm – The first is whether a secondary low pressure system forms near Long Island and tracks towards the Gulf of Maine or not. The second item that will need to be monitored is how far north does above freezing temperatures aloft get pushed into the area.

The reason why these two things are important is because if we do see the formation of a secondary low pressure system, it may try to lock in the cold air across the region leading to mostly all snow, instead of a messy mixture. Now, if we don’t see that secondary low form, then it could lead to above freezing air aloft to spread into the area leading to much more in the way of freezing rain and sleet rather than snow.

At this point, my thinking is that we’ll see snow begin across the entire area around midnight or so Wednesday night. This snow is then expected to continue for several hours during the after midnight hours.

A change from snow to freezing rain and sleet is then expected to occur from south to north beginning across areas near and south of the Mass Pike just before sunrise Thursday morning and reaching far northern parts of Worcester County by just after sunrise Thursday morning.

The mixture of freezing rain and sleet is then expected to continue for a few hours on Thursday morning before all precipitation comes to an end

In terms of possible snow accumulations, I think that we’re probably still looking at about 1 to 3 inches of snowfall accumulation during Wednesday night. Ice amounts on Thursday morning still look to be a light glaze, but still enough to lead to some slippery travel throughout Thursday morning.

The storm on Wednesday night and Thursday morning will be watched closely, especially for any trends towards more snow or towards more ice. Updates will be sent out as needed.

Low temperatures Wednesday night will be between 20 and 25 Degrees. High temperatures Thursday will be near 35 Degrees.

Another Winter Storm To Keep An Eye On From Saturday Night Through Sunday & Sunday Night: After a high pressure system gives the area a sunny day on Friday and an increase in clouds on Saturday, I will be closely watching the progress of a storm system that’s expected to affect the area beginning on Saturday night and continuing though all of Sunday and all of Sunday night.

There remains quite a few questions as to where exactly this storm system will track in relation to our area & whether there will be one main storm or two storm system that affect the area over a 2 day period. Because of this, there is a considerable amount of uncertainty as to whether this is going to be mostly all snow, which brings the region heavy snow accumulations or whether it’ll be a messy mixed bag of snow, sleet and freezing rain that brings a combination of a few inches of snow that’s followed by a glaze of ice accumulation. Another possible scenario is for a mostly all rain scenario from this storm system.

Unfortunately, there are no clear indications as of yet as to which scenario looks more probable. It goes without saying that I will be watching this storm system very closely and will have more updates for you as needed.