First though, it will get quite cold tonight with lows in the low to mid 20's, followed by increasing cloudiness tomorrow and a chance of a little light snow or a snow shower tomorrow afternoon or evening. The highs tomorrow will be in the upper 20's to low 30's.
Tuesday light snow, sleet and freezing rain will develop early in the morning, then it will quickly change to rain in the early morning in Northeastern New Jersey, and it will change over to rain, sleet, or freezing in most other areas of Northern New Jersey later in the morning. It will then likely change back to heavy wet snow in Northwestern New Jersey in the afternoon and continue until the morning hours on Wednesday, although it should lighten up late at night. In Northeastern New Jersey there would be rain continuing into Wednesday morning, then changing to light snow and snow showers on Wednesday morning.
The main concern here is for Northwestern New Jersey. There will be an EXTREMELY HEAVY BAND of precipitation wrapping around the low pressure center and into our area, almost like you would get in a hurricane. This will cause the atmosphere to cool rapidly when the band moves into our area. Northeastern Pennsylvania will be in this band and hence the massive snowfall accumulations and power outages that are likely to occur there. Northwestern New Jersey may get into this wrap around band as well, especially areas closer to the Pennsylvania border. Areas that are underneath this band will likely turn over to HEAVY wet snow on Tuesday afternoon, and I fear possibly even starting in the late morning. I truly fear that the data is not handling this exactly right and that many forecasters are missing this. I could be wrong, but this is my fear. It could also be that the data will pick up on this tomorrow. I can easily see some surprises in Northwestern New Jersey as far as heavy snow potential goes from late morning through Wednesday morning. Remember how the rain changed to snow here the day before Thanksgiving? It could happen again. Will it, I am not certain, but it could. The big problem is that if it does, there will be no warning at all and the intensity of the snow will be incredible and MUCH heavier for several hours than we saw in the previous storm.
So, what could alleviate my fear? If the storm center would track closer to the coast or come inland it would allow warmer air into our area and that would certainly remove any snow threat for Northwestern New Jersey.
What could increase my fear? The storm center could track further east and then all of Northern New Jersey would be in this band and Northwestern New Jersey would move into the same position that Northeastern Pennsylvania is in now.
Only time will tell.
The storm will then sit around and spin through Saturday, and each time it goes back out over the ocean it will pick up a little moisture and bring us back some rain or snow snow showers. This is truly a fascinating weather situation. Unfortunately though, from a human perspective, many people in the area with the heavy wet snow will be without power for quite a while as the power crews won't even be able to get to their homes as there will be a widespread area of 1-3 foot snow totals from Central and Northeastern Pennsylvania, through most of New York State (excluding far southeastern sections), Western Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire (excluding southeastern sections), and Maine (excluding coastal sections).
There will also be strong winds to deal with as gusts of up to 60 mph will occur along the coast and 40-50 mph gusts will be possible on Tuesday in Northeastern New Jersey, and 30-40 mph gusts in Northwestern New Jersey. This is likely to bring down tree limbs and some trees. When you combine this with the heavy wet snow in some areas it adds up to hundreds of thousands of people without power for a long duration in the Northeastern United States.
The areas that receive rains will have problems with flooding as well, so be sure to check your sump pumps and generators in case you lose power as well.
After this storm finally departs on Saturday we will have a nice Sunday and Monday. Then clouds will increase on Tuesday and it currently looks as if everyone will have a snowstorm next Tuesday through Thursday. I think this time it will be cold enough for snow throughout Northern New Jersey.
Join me in the morning and lets see if the storm wants to track closer to the coast and warm us up, alleviating some of the problems, or further off the coast and causing bigger problems.
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