About 4 To 8 Inches Of Snow Accumulation Looks Likely For Very Late Thursday Night & Friday

For This Afternoon: An area of high pressure will continue to control our weather this afternoon with lots of sunshine expected. High temperatures this afternoon will be between 30 and 35 Degrees. Tonight: That area of high pressure will push to the east tonight and because of this, the wind flow is expected to become south to southwest. Skies will start out clear to partly cloudy this evening, but will become cloudy after midnight tonight. The low temperatures tonight of near 20 Degrees will occur this evening with temperatures expected to rise to near 25 Degrees after midnight tonight. Some valley locations and colder spots will probably fall to between 10 and 15 Degrees this evening before temperatures rise into the 20s after midnight. Wednesday: A weak storm system will move within the southwesterly wind flow across our area during Wednesday. This system will bring widespread rain showers to the entire area beginning around the 8 to 10 am time frame and then continuing on and off throughout the rest of the day on Wednesday. The rain shower activity will likely come to an end by late afternoon Wednesday. Be aware that some of the showers may start out as a bit of freezing rain in the Connecticut River Valley where subfreezing temperatures may hang on until about 10 am. After that though, temperatures will rise above freezing and the showers will be in the form of just rain. High temperatures Wednesday will be near 45 Degrees. Thursday: Colder air will push back into the area on Thursday behind that frontal system. Skies on Thursday will generally be partly sunny, however, clouds will be on the increase late in the day as our potential snowstorm for Friday approaches from the southwest. High temperatures Thursday will be near 35 Degrees. A 4 To 8 Inch Snowfall Looks Likely For Very Late Thursday Night Through Friday: An area of low pressure is expected to take shape over the lower Ohio Valley and the Tennessee Valley on Thursday and move to near the Virginia coast by Thursday night. This low pressure system is then expected to track very near the Cape on Friday before moving towards Atlantic Canada on Friday night. This is the type of potential track that would bring all snow to all of Western and Central Mass with more than enough snow accumulation to plow and shovel. With that said, this does not look like a major crippling snowstorm as the storm system will be moving too quickly to lay down substantial snow amounts. Here Are My Thoughts: I think that snow will overspread all of Western and Central Mass probably between about 3 and 5 am or so Friday morning. The snow is then expected to continue through much of the day Friday. The snow may fall at a moderate to heavy rate at times during the late morning and early afternoon hours and this is when the worst part of the storm will be. Snow is expected to come to an end across the entire area around late afternoon Friday I still think that possible snow amounts will be in the neighborhood of 4 to 8 inches across the entire area. The 4 inch amounts will probably be found across northern Worcester County (Route 2 corridor) and the upper Pioneer Valley of Western Mass. Amounts closer to 6 to 8 inches of snow accumulation may occur in the area near and south of the Mass Pike. It goes without saying that I’m watching Friday’s storm very closely and will have more updates as needed. This Weekend Into Early Next Week: An area of high pressure will build into the area for Saturday giving us a sunny and cold day. High temperatures Saturday will be between 25 and 30 Degrees. A frontal boundary is expected to push through the area during Sunday afternoon and Sunday evening. This means that skies will be cloudy on Sunday and there’s likely to be some scattered snow and rain showers during the afternoon. High temperatures Sunday will be between 35 and 40 Degrees. Looking ahead to the first half of next week, it appears that an Arctic air mass will settle itself over New England and it’s likely to get quite cold around here, especially on Tuesday and Wednesday. Monday looks partly sunny with temperatures between 25 and 30 Degrees. Next Tuesday is expected to be partly sunny and it’s going to be cold. High temperatures Tuesday will be between 15 and 20 Degrees. Next Wednesday also looks cold, but partly sunny. High temperatures next Wednesday will be between 20 and 25 Degrees.