Good Thursday everyone. Old Man Winter is alive and kicking and looks to bring the threat for accumulating snows to much of the region late Friday into early Saturday. This is all ahead of an arctic front that will usher a very cold weekend into town. That’s my kind of weekend.

Today looks to be a fairly quiet day with temps into the upper 30s and lower 40s under a partly sunny sky.

The action picks up on Friday as clouds quickly increase from the southwest early in the day. Moisture will be surging in during this time as our temps make a run toward 40. A mixture of rain and snow will break out, but the atmospheric profile suggests a rapid drop in temps as the precipitation begins. This means a quick change to snow as temps drop to near freezing by late afternoon and early evening. Snow would then continue into the overnight Friday as our arctic front surges in.

Notice a good amount of precipitation showing up on the GFS…

This is actually pretty close to blowing up a major storm along the east coast and is something to keep an eye on. Snowfall from that particular run of the GFS looks like this…

The NAM looks very similar…

This is a setup that can easily drop a few inches of snow for much of the region. The question is… will it work out? I smell a first call for snowfall map later today. 😉

Snow showers and flurries should continue into Saturday as gusty northwesterly winds blow. Temps may not get out of the low and mid 20s for some areas and will fall into the teens by evening. Sunday morning lows may dip toward 10 degrees if we can put some snow on the ground.

Overall… this is a wintry weekend ahead of us.

The fun may not stop there, as the pattern for early next week features a low pressure working west to east to our south. This happens with cold air across the northern half of the country and that may put us in line for a wintry mix of weather Monday night through Wednesday. You can see this clearly on the Canadian Model…

Snow, Ice, Rain or a combo of the three? We have several days to watch it. Let’s take ’em one at a time and focus on the late Friday and Saturday system. I will have another update and first call map out later today, so check back.

Have a great Thursday and take care.