Arctic Cold Reaches New England Early Thursday; Snow Not Far Behind

The rush is on! Just a few more days until Christmas to finish up shopping, baking and coordinating. Cold winds and chilly temps all set the mood for the holiday, but tomorrow’s light snow is the icing on the cake. A weak – but somewhat important – weather system will slide through and deliver a shot of accumulating snow to save most of us from a brown Christmas.

First the cold. Highs will struggle to even meet the freezing mark today thanks to a small batch of arctic air that slipped over the border last night. This eventually gets bounced by tomorrow’s snow, but it will provide us with wind chills in the single digits and teens for the early part of the day.

Tomorrow’s snow – albeit light – will fall on frozen ground with temperatures in the 20s. This is a combo we haven’t seen in many spots this winter, and will certainly make for slippery travel from the early to late morning. It isn’t a lot (only a coating to 1 inch), but a little goes a long way in making things slick. Keep it slow and allow plenty of distance between you and other cars if you’re traveling.

We’re taking on the weekend weather debacle with eyes wide open. There are two weak weather systems ganging up on us. The models have been having fits over the type of precipitation that will fall. As of this typing, they are coming to a consensus: It’s favoring wet more than white for this go-round (surprise). We’ll see some light snow and mix Saturday (negligible accumulations), then wait for the main batch of mix and rain to move through Saturday night and Sunday. We’re talking temps in the 40s, so there won’t be much of a hassle with travel. The exception may be across northern Mass. and southern New Hampshire late on Saturday into early Sunday. It’s here that some icing may be problematic for a few hours.

We’ll keep tabs on that and Santa right into Christmas. Until then, drive safe, be well, and have a great holiday!