And so it begins!

 Looking at the surface chart and radar.

Y'all can see the arctic front approaching and about ready to move through This is going to kick the lake effect bands to the south. This band has been Pounding the tug hill for the last couple of days. That will continue today or another 6-12 plus " of snow will be possible As the arctic front pushes through The band is going to move south And end up near Syracuse and over the mohawk valley Late this afternoon and evening. Tonight the band is going to weaken and  end  the lake snow warnings East of lake Ontario. But The lake effect snow will  linger into Saturday before it completely dissipates. Behind this arctic front We're going to replace the current polar air mass With a true arctic air mass. This will be the coldest air so far this winter  is going to move into the region, Air temperatures are going to be in the teens to well below 0 across the region. With the wind Wind chills are going to be Downright dangerous, Northern parts of the region will likely see wind chills of -40--50 °Fahrenheit Wind chill This low means frostbite can set in in as little as 10-15 minutes. For this reason  the National Weather Service has an Extreme Cold Warning Over northern parts of New York State and New England extending down through western Massachusetts. Wind chills across the rest of the region will still be brutal but they won't meet the criteria for a extreme cold warning. Wind chills across the rest of the region should be running below  zero to -30° F.

The weekend into Monday

Saturday should be generally tranquil across the region.

Image credit tropical tidbits

The 1st major storm of this winter is coming together over Texas.

We have our blocking up over the north Atlantic extending into the Hudson Bay, The short wave energy In the polar jet over Canada getting ready to drop into the US, There is also that energy moving over Baja California That's going to head east. The northern and subtropical jet stream are going to phase and become the biggest storm we have seen in a few years. I've been talking about the setup and pattern for quite a few days and how this is going to become a Miller B. type storm that will head towards the Ohio Valley and then transfer it's energy to the Coast and because a coastal low just east of the New Jersey/Delaware Coast. So I'm not going to go over old ground.

That warm moist air Driving into an extremely cold air mass Is going to set up a baroclinic zone where the temperature contrast is going to create a nor'easter Here is a look at the Euro courtesy of tropical tidbits We're looking at the 850mb in the mid levels.

These show that energy transfer west of the Appalachians to the coast off of  New Jersey. As I said these are from the euro but all the rest of the models look very similar. 

Over the last 4 or 5 days I've been doing daily breakdown on how the storm looks to set up. The storm has evolved and now looks very much like I've been laying out. 

The meso-scale models are coming into range. In these images courtesy of tropical tidbits. We can see the warmer temperatures closer to the coast. This is going to lead to that mix of sleet and freezing rain I've been talking about.

Looking at the timestamps You can see That these warmer temperatures come in Later in the storm. So for the first half to three quarters of the storm temperatures are going to be cold enough for all snow across the entire region. With the extreme cold I've been talking about for several days We are going to have high liquid to snow ratios of 15-1 to 25-1. This will make the snow very light and fluffy. So it will pile up very quickly.

Here is a look at the current national weather services watches and warnings and advisories. These have expanded from yesterday and now encompass a large part of our region. As we move forward These are going to expand And it compass the entire region And we will see many of these watches turn into warnings. This is going to be the biggest snowstorm our region has seen in several years.

This will be a long duration storm lasting into Tuesday.

This event looks to be fairly dialed in at this time.  General impacts look to be the same as I was laying out yesterday.

Across eastern and southern New Jersey, back into Southern Delaware 4-8 " of snow With a changeover to sleep and freezing rain. Across northern New Jersey Back into Central into northern Delaware, Central Maryland Including Washington DC. 6-12 " of snow With a change over to sleep and freezing rain.

For Northern Maryland including Baltimore, Northern Delaware, Northern New Jersey, New York city and long island, coastal Connecticut and coastal Rhode Island Along with the Cape and off-shore islands a general 8-14 inches of snow with locally higher amounts possible is looking likely, this area is likely to see a change over to some sleet and freezing rain at some point.  The rest of Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts Including Boston into southern Vermont, southern New Hampshire and southwest Maine  along with southeast New York state Including the New York capital district 14-24 inches with locally higher amounts possible. Most of the rest Of New York State into central and part of western Pennsylvania including Philadelphia and across central Vermont and central Hampshire. 12-18 inches is likely. Most of western Pennsylvania Including Pittsburgh look to see 8  14 inches of snow. Northern New York state northern Vermont Northern New Hampshire into central and northern Maine looks to see 8-12 inches of snow, Western New York state Into north western Pennsylvania Looks to see a general 5-8 inches of snow Far northern Maine Will likely see 4-8 inches as well.

Winds during this event are going to be running 5-15 mph with gust of 20-30 miles an hour across interior parts of the region. Across a large part of southern and central New England Into the capital district of New York State down into the Catskills  and northeastern Pennsylvania Snowfall rates of 1-2  inches per hour will be possible at times ; So road crews may have a hard time keeping up. I'm not expecting widespread power outages but some localized power outages are likely.

Right now it looks like the snow will be moving into southwest Pennsylvania including Pittsburgh around 10 to 11 PM on Saturday, The storm will continue moving north and east through Sunday. Looking to get into Maine during the early afternoon on Sunday. With the storm pulling away from Maine Tuesday morning.

Have a great day.