A late season signifigant mountain snowstorm will impact the Northeast Thursday night through Friday. Most of the accumulating snow should be confined to mountain areas above 1500ft with the most amounts above 2000ft. Expect very little snow and mostly rain for low lying areas. As the storm pulls away it is possible flakes will fly in areas of Mass, CT, and Maine.
Lets take a look...
A closed low/vortex at 18000ft will be approaching New England Thursday. This vortex is bringing with it very cold air aloft....
As this approaches, moisture from the southern jet stream also works it way towards the region from the south...
Due to a big blocking pattern in place (high pressure over Greenland), the flow slows down and these two systems combine and form a coastal storm...
Notice above how the model tries to show it only snowing in higher elevation areas. This makes sense. When you get these very late season storms, even though it is cold enough aloft to snow, the air near the surface is still pretty warm. Due to this, the mountains get all the snow as they are higher up thus colder at the surface.
The European model shows this well with a nice accumulating snow event in the Catskills, Green, Berkshires, Adirondack and White Mountains...
In other areas that are not truly mountains but higher sitting such as NW CT, Central Mass, flakes can fly, but i do not expect much accumulating snow.
When it is all said and done I think the highest peaks (3000ft+) can see 8 to 14 inches like this. This means Killington Ski area can do quite well.
Stay tuned.
