Winter Storm on the Way!

We have got ourselves an old fashioned New England winter storm on the way to end this weekend. We will expect the snow to develop for all of New England during the afternoon Sunday. It will spread into our area from southwest to northeast and quickly become moderate to heavy, especially north of the Pike. I made this map as a first outlook for what I am expecting for all of New England. I haven't put numbers to these yet, just categorized them. We will start with extreme southern New England, down on the South Coast and Cape. Here we will start as a very brief period of moderate snow that will eventually mix with sleet and then change to rain as temperatures should come up to the mid and upper 30's within a few hours of a ESE wind. There is a possiblility of at least seeing a coating to slushy inch of snowfall in this area. The pink shading is the variable and question mark. Here, if the GFS is correct, we will see more mixing with sleet/rain, but if the NAM is correct, we will only see a brief period of mixing, and a mainly snow event. If I had to put numbers to the pink area, I would say that conservatively 2-4" of snow is likely, including the city of Boston itself. Just N&W of the city, snowfall amounts will increase dramatically. Just 5 miles NW, say in Medford to Newton, we will see a mainly snow event with snowfall amounts in the blue up to southern New Hampshire and southern Vermont ranging from about 6" in Newton to 10-12" in Keene, NH. The blue area for all of New England is where a general 6-12" of snow will fall. More like 5-8" if you want to get more specific inside of Route 495 and especially 128. Then we get into central NH, VT, and ME. This is where temperatures will be in the upper teens throughout the event with heavy snows and gusty winds in excess of 30mph. There is the possiblility of seeing near blizzard conditions at this time. Snowfall, especially in ME, could be very heavy. We could easily see snowfall amounts of 12-24" in the red area. Some places like Sunday River and other ski resorts interior ME could see between 24-36" of snowfall, a dry fluffy snowfall. This is no joke. This will be a major storm that you will need to follow every step of the way until it starts because things are not set in stone just yet.

I will post a more detailed snowfall map with numbers sometime tonight or tomorrow.