Thursday will be the calm before the storm, literally! This maps shows where the storm will be located on Thursday afternoon–well west of New England…
We’re still thinking the biggest issues with this storm will be the wind, especially along the coast Friday morning.
That map shows the peak gusts with the storm but:
Those gusts will occur early and late in the day, not the entire day.
Along the coastline the 55-65mph gusts only occur before 9am.
For much of the day, most of the region will see gusts between 35-45mph.
This can also be shown with our computer models at various times through the day. Here is 6am Friday morning…
Now, check this out, here is 12pm on Friday…
Those wind speeds won’t be strong enough for tree/powerline concerns. I do think as the arctic front shows up later Friday afternoon (4-7pm) there will be another uptick in the winds for a short time. The takeaway is that Friday will be windy all day and evening and for some locations (especially along the coast), that wind will briefly be damaging Friday morning and again early Friday evening. That’s the wind, rain will be a factor too, drenching the region with 1-2″ beginning Thursday evening and continuing into midday Friday.
Thankfully, that wind will dry off roads before the temps crash Friday evening but some areas of freeze-up are likely Friday evening.
The rain and mild air are long gone by Saturday but the wind (non-damaging) remains. Temps will start in the teens and only reach the 20s by afternoon. Cold! Brrrrrr. Christmas Day offers sunny skies but cold temps with high temps only in the upper 20s. Thankfully, that wind is out of here.
~JR