We are in the midst of a fall nor’easter here in New England, making for a less than pleasant Monday. While Tuesday looks better, it’s still not great. Both days will be chilly, raw days with temperatures in the 50s, a gusty wind, and on-and-off showers. We are in the “height” of the storm now. I use quotes because it’s not really this unbelievable storm and was never expected to be, but with leaves on the trees, some tree damage was expected with the wind gusts the storm brought.
We’ll start with the rain. Rain started Sunday mid to late morning across the Cape and Islands and made an incredibly slow progression to the north during the day. The rain, of course, continues to fall and will (in some form) through Tuesday. Where the rain started earlier, rainfall reports are highest. A few 2″+ reports are starting to trickle in, especially across the Cape and South Coast. This 2″ + list is as of the writing of this blog (about 6am). In general, towns south of the Pike have seen 1-2″, and communities north of the Pike 1/2 – 1″.
As rain continues to fall today and through Tuesday, rain tallies will continue to climb. In general, I think most towns fall in the 1-3″ range but coastal Plymouth county and parts of the Cape could see as much as 4-4.5″. That sounds like a lot (it is a lot), but keep in mind it’s falling over two and a half days so the flooding risk remains low. More than anything, it’s probably urban and poor drainage flooding we’d be concerned about, especially if the storm drains get clogged with leaves that have fallen either naturally, or by the wind we’ve seen in the last day.
The wind ramped up overnight and will stay strong until about noon. At noontime the wind will not just shut off. Much like the rain, the wind will very slowly cycle down over the next two days. We really don’t see true relief until Tuesday afternoon, with the gusty wind with us all day, all night, and even Tuesday morning. The strongest of the wind arrived overnight and brought some wind gusts in the 40s and close to 50 mph.
We have a wind advisory and high wind warning in effect for the day today for the continued risk of these strong winds. The Islands have the potential to gust up to 55 mph and the Cape to 50 mph. That’s where the wind headlines are in effect. Elsewhere, will be a windy day with coastal Massachusetts seeing wind gusts in the 40-45 mph range and interior Massachusetts gusting 30-40 mph.
Moving forward over the next 24 hours the storm will very slowly unwind itself. The wind will very slowly taper off and the showers will become more and more scattered as time passes. The steady rain from overnight will become scattered showers through much of the day today. Now, that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily all light showers, there could be some heavier pockets of rain that still move through from time to time. By Tuesday, those scattered showers become more isolated. Be we won’t totally dry out until late Tuesday evening and into Wednesday. The wind is much of the same staying windy and gusty all day today and very slowly relaxing tonight and through the day Tuesday.
