Quick Arctic Wave with Snow, then. . .

Some of you may have noticed that it’s snowing or forecast to snow tonight.  This is due to a fast moving arctic wave or disturbance that is trailing the cold front that went through yesterday.  Snow has been falling at BWI in Baltimore for a couple hours, but only 0.1″ has been recorded thus far.  In general, I look for this to be a 1″-2″ event, with maybe someone getting 3″ due to possible localized mesoscale bands forming (very challenging to forecast in advance).

The Sterling WFO and Mt. Holly WFO snow maps are presented below.

lwx_snowfall_20170105_1800est
Sterling WFO snowfall map issued at 6:04 pm EST valid until 10 a.m. on 01/06/17.
phi_snowfall_20170105_1601est
Mt. Holly WFO snow map issued at 4:01 pm EST valid until 1:00 pm EST on 01/06/17.

Snow should continue until about 2:00 am EST from DC-Baltimore area, but until 4-5 am farther north and east as the system quickly exits stage right.  Be careful if you have to be out and about tonight!

As for the next system, I’ll post on it tomorrow.  The models have generally trended farther to the north and west, which might now include portions of the I-95 corridor from DC up through NYC and Boston.  I’d like to see some more data before getting too excited.

Thanks for reading!

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