This week's Weather Wednesday looks into the incoming warm-up followed by a cold snap likely next week. We also look at a potential coastal storm coming to New England early next week. We also look at the blockbuster, marathon blizzard that struck Nova Scotia this past weekend.
Prefer to read? There's a written version below the video. You can also read about Nova Scotia's blizzard here.
After a rather stagnant weather pattern over the past several days, the pattern will be shifting. This shift comes in the form of a ridge sliding eastward as it breaks down. This will allow more mild airmass that has been bottled up to our west slide into New England. Each day will be a bit warmer than the last until it peaks on Saturday, with highs well into the 40s in northern areas and well into the 50s in southern areas.
Reaching 60° in the warm spots of southern New England isn’t out of the question, though cloud cover may limit this potential. Most areas will likely fall short of daily record highs on Saturday, but if everything aligns right, some records could fall. Most southern New England climate locations have daily record highs into the 60s for February 10th.
The warmth on Saturday comes as a system will pass to New England’s north. This will drag a warm front across New England. This setup puts New England in the warm sector, with a strong southerly flow transporting mild air from the south into New England. This front will trigger some clouds and isolated showers.
The overall trend has been for less shower activity and many areas will not only be warm, but also mainly dry with potentially some sun coming out on Saturday. So, we’ll have the strong warm air advection, but we won’t have an intense storm along with it like we had in these situations in December and January. It will really feel like spring on Saturday.
If you would rather February feel like winter, this warmth will not be lasting. The system will drag a cold front across the region later on Saturday into Sunday. This front will not create a sharp cool down, it will more likely be a gradual drop in temperatures with Sunday still well above average.
The temperature trend will continue downward back to more seasonable levels after the weekend. Right from the start of February, signals have been pointing to a colder late February than early February. We mentioned this in our monthly outlook. This continues to hold true with much cooler air likely for next week and potentially beyond.
This comes as North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) is expected to begin to weaken. Arctic Oscillation (AO) will also crash into a deep negative phase after starting the month strongly positive. A weaker/negative phase of both these oscillations would support more cold air intrusions getting into New England. Also heading toward the middle of the month, a persistent trough in the western United States will begin to weaken and shift eastward.
Arctic Oscillation trends and forecast:
All of this points toward a potential cooler, more winter-like weather for the second half of the month with increased potential for arctic blasts. Also heading into next week, storm chances return.
A coastal storm is looking increasingly likely to form early next week and move near New England Monday into Tuesday. As you’d expect from this point, there is a wide range in potential tracks with a more mild storm bringing rain and snow or a mostly snow event possible.
This is the main feature we’ll be watching through this week as accumulating snow is becoming more likely somewhere in New England out of this one. Models will continue to go back and forth on what will happen with this storm over the next couple days before settling on a track heading into Friday afternoon and Saturday morning, as usual.
Colder air will be filtering into New England during this time frame with a cold front possibly dropping into New England early next week. The question may come down to how quickly can things cool off from the weekend to get into snow versus rain. There’s plenty to watch with this one, and we will be watching.
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