The first of three snowstorms made it’s presence felt today with a generous and record breaking 8 inches in New York, 6.6 inches at JFK and 6.5 inches at Islip. There was also decent amounts north and south of the NYC area and points west.

While today’s system leaves the field, the next in line has already pushed through California bringing much needed rain. Unfortunately some showers and perhaps longer spells of rain/snow in higher elevations won’t do much for the drought given severity but hopefully this positive sign will continue.

Here’s the GFS through 12 hours and note the system crossing the Rockies, that pushed through SoCal last evening bringing threatening skies and some showers.

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By tomorrow and once out over the Plains, the energy pulls together as it plugs Gulf moisture and draws dry arctic air from the north. This thing could be a sizable snow producer for the mid-section of the country including cities such as Wichita, Kansas City, St Louis, Chicago, Detroit and points further east into Wednesday.

As you can see by 36 hours, the system is gathering steam and drawing warmth and moisture from the Gulf and with plenty of cold air being sucked in on the backside. Some decent, heavy snowfall is likely through the Mid-Mississippi/northern Ohio Valleys including cities like Indy.

By 48 hrs it’s taking aim at the Northeast, looks focus of heaviest shows is shifting closer to the big cities rather than interior. This could be a bigger hammering than what we saw today, especially points north and south of NYC with some seeing well over a foot. Even cities like Chicago, Indy, Detroit, Cleveland could see 6-10″ from this. Amazingly another big system hits this weekend, could be a third major snowstorm particularly for the NYC area inside a week.

Here’s the latest ECMWF snow chart through the next 72 hours.

GFS has solid 8-14 inch snow from south-central PA through Philly, Trenton, Newark, NYC, Hartford and Providence.

By Friday it’s back to cold, cold, cold for the Northeast in the wake of the 2nd big snow system but cast your eyes to the Rockies, here comes the next one!

More on weekend storm in tomorrow’s post! Before I close though, check out the SNOW DEPTH by the end of this weekend! Although there’s certain melting, especially with the slightly stronger February sun, this chart could be underdone with depths along the I-95, given the 6-10 inches today, another 8-12 Wed then another major system this weekend.

GFS

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