Update on Potential for Snow Friday and Saturday...

The latest 7 AM (Feb. 4, 2010) weather forecast models (NAM, GFS, ECMWF, UKMET) continue to hold the heaviest snow and rain to the south of the NYC metropolitan area on Friday night and Saturday. The latest NAM solution has shifted the heaviest forecast snow a little more to the north across southern and central NJ with a very sharp cutoff in response to the northwest flow in the jetstream across eastern Canada and New England. A major snowstorm is forecast to the south of NYC across southern NJ, southeast PA, MD, DE and VA. There could be a foot or more in these areas except close to the ocean where some mixed precipitation could occur. This storm looks like it will produce a heavy snowfall from central NJ southward. As I mentioned on earlier posts, the track for yesterday's storm and the one last Saturday was to the south of the NYC metro area. A closed low or cyclonic vortex over eastern Canada and dry, strong surface high pressure over New England can prevent coastal storms from tracking up the coast which looks as if this is forecast to happen in this case. The latest model runs slow the storm down a little more in response to the ridge/blocking pattern over the western Atlantic. There is plenty of moisture, it continues to appear that the heaviest snow will remain to the south of northern NJ and NYC/Long Island once again. But a difference of 10 or 20 miles can bring about a large change in the amount of snow that accumulates in and around NYC. More on this storm later today.

George Wright is a Certified Consulting Meteorologist and President of Wright Weather Consulting, Inc. Our website is WrightWeather.com. George is also a meteorologist with News 12 Cablevision.