Well we couldn’t do it in time for a White Christmas, but those on the Cape and the Islands will see their first accumulating snow of the season! While snow flakes may be seen as far north as Boston, any sort of accumulation will be held along and south of Route 44, and it will be a sharp cut off as you travel north from Nantucket.
To break down snow totals a bit more:
Numbers are highest on Nantucket but accumulating snow will lead to snow covered roads across the entire Cape, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket. For that reason a Winter Weather Advisory and Winter Storm Warning has been issued until 9pm. The difference is really just a numbers game of about an inch or two of snow accumulation, but the impacts will be the same. Plan on slick/poor travel and snow covered roads in these areas this afternoon and evening.
In addition to snow, we’re talking wind. This is not a powerhouse nor’easter, but wind gusts could hit 40 mph especially on the Cape, Islands, and South Shore. Tides right now are astronomically high so we’ll likely see some splash over and inundation in low lying areas and shore roads through the midday hours today. One to two feet of inundation are possible in these areas. High tide today is between 11am and noon. The threat of coastal flooding book ends that by a few hours so we’ll be watching from 9am to 2pm for inundation and road closures.
Here’s a rough timeline of both the snow and wind. You can see at times today the wind gusts 30-40 mph which will not only lead to the coastal flooding potential, but a bitter wind for the rest of us. While air temperatures top out in the upper 20s to near 30 today, it will feel about 10 degrees colder counting for the wind chill.
11 AM: Light snow starts to fall on the Islands and south of Route 6 on the Cape. Winds aren’t bad at this point, gusting to 30 mph on the Cape, Islands, and South Shore. Everyone else will see wind gusts to 20 mph. So not as gusty but still enough to put a bite into the air.
4 PM: Snow will pick up in intensity by early afternoon. A few bands could produce heavy snowfall rates and that will overcome warmer road temperatures and pile up on the roads. Travel will go downhill after 2pm. Also notice the wind gusts at this point, pushing 40 mph on the South Shore, Cape, and Islands.
8 PM: The snow will start to lighten up at 6-7:00. But notice by 8 pm it’s still snowing, just lighter. We’ll deal with light snow until about 9:00 tonight until the entire system moves away by midnight. Even as the snow ends, the wind will remain quite gusty overnight (to 45 mph in spots) before coming down by sunrise Tuesday.
If you’re a little jealous about the snow coming to the Cape and Islands today, don’t fret. We are watching another storm on Friday. It’s too far out to put any fine details on it, but it’s looking more and more likely that more of us will see accumulating snow to close out the work week. We’ll fine tune this as we head through the week.
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