Oh, yes. It's an interesting week to be a meteorologist in Vermont (lucky me). Plenty of action happening tonight with a foot or more of snowfall for some towns nestled in the Green mountains. A unique orographic snow event (or "terrain driven" snow event) will leave many digging out in the morning. Some locales such as Belvidere, Richford, Bakersfield, and Cambridge, just to name a few will find a foot or more of new snow on the ground since Wednesday afternoon through Thursday afternoon. While others, lower in elevation, or on the other side of the Green mountains will not see much. Maybe 2-5" new snowfall. Even less for the lowest Champlain Valley and CT River Valley.
So, with that, let's talk about what's next. A weekend storm, perhaps? Yes! I'm confident to say we will get snow this weekend on the order 6 inches or more in some of VT, parts of NY, and parts of NH. I can't give you too much detail yet, but I can tell you this.
- A coastal storm will impact much of New England and New York Saturday night through Sunday (yes, this makes the third weekend in a row for southern New England)!.The general movement of 2 systems merging into 1 coastal storm will make this forecast challenging (generally, these are not well handled by weather models). See images (left) for progression.
-6" or more of snow looks likely for many, with a chance of 12" or more in far southern Vermont and southern New Hampshire
-Snow will be heaviest in intensity Sunday morning, then gradually taper Sunday evening
-Snow variety will be a wetter, heavier consistency. This may lead to power outages this weekend.
-While winds do not look to be a large factor, they will be at least "breezy" (over 15 mph) for many areas, stronger with local terrain variation. With this, additional power outages may become a concern with the addition of wet, heavy snowfall.
We'll keep you in the loop, of course! Keep checking in with our latest forecast and blogs for later posts/updates. This blog was posted at 11pm Wednesday, February 20.
