Snow may slow travel in northeastern US next week

By Alex Sosnowski, AccuWeather.com Senior Meteorologist

February 4,2016; 11:05PM,EST

 

 

Snow will impact portions of the mid-Atlantic and New England next Monday through Wednesday.
However, the extent and intensity of the snow are not set in stone at this time.
The areas of snow will evolve as arctic air advances eastward from the Midwest and two storms track northeastward near the Atlantic coast.
According to AccuWeather Chief Meteorologist Elliot Abrams, "How extensive and how heavy the snow is from place to place will depend on how the colder air and the two storms interact with each other."
What to expect early next week
At this time, a repeat of the late-January blizzard with 2-3 feet of snow over a large area appears highly unlikely. It is also unlikely for snow to fall continuously for during the three-day period from Monday to Wednesday. More often than not, there will not be accumulating snow during the period.

During the January blizzard, there was a very sharp northern edge to the snow. The storm setup is different for early next week. There are likely to be multiple pockets of accumulating snow intertwined with non-accumulating flurries scattered throughout the mid-Atlantic and New England.
There is the potential for enough snow to fall to create slippery travel, to cause disruptions to daily activities and to trigger flight delays from portions of Virginia to Maine during the first few days of next week.
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Depending on the track and strength of the storms and where the snow persists for several hours, parts of the region could receive a couple of inches to perhaps a foot of snow.
Scenarios on the snow next week
Early indications suggest that there will be two main areas of moderate to heavy snow, with lighter snowfall in between, during Monday to Wednesday.
A swath of moderate to heavy snow may sweep from the mid-Atlantic through much of New England, with widespread and significant travel disruptions, if an Atlantic storm remains weak and remains at sea on Monday. This would allow a second storm from the Midwest to become stronger and to move slowly toward the Northeast.
Should the Atlantic storm become very strong, it is more likely to hug the coast or perhaps turn toward Nova Scotia. In this case, heavy snow would move quickly northward through coastal New England with a void of snow from western New England to the central Appalachians on Monday into Monday night. Another batch of light to moderate snow and flurries, associated with a weaker Midwest storm, would then rotate eastward across the mid-Atlantic during Tuesday into Wednesday.
Regardless of the two storm tracks and their intensities, the weather pattern from Monday into Wednesday will turn wintry with areas of accumulating snow scattered about mid-Atlantic and New England.
Only if one of the storms strengthens rapidly and stalls would snow accumulate 1-2 feet, leading to travel shutdowns.
AccuWeather will continue to provide updates on the potential for storms and wintry precipitation in the Northeast in the coming days.