Less than a week after a historic winter storm pummeled large parts of the central and Eastern United States with heavy snow and ice, forecasters are warning that another significant system could move into the East Coast this weekend.
Here are the key things to know:
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What will happen?: The forecast could change, and change again, before the weekend. While forecasters are fairly confident that a storm will develop, key details — including its strength, where it will go and how much snow or ice it will deliver — remained uncertain on Wednesday.
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Timing: The storm is expected to form on Saturday off the southeastern coast and then move north into the Mid-Atlantic and New England on Sunday.
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It will not warm up: Cold air will continue across much of the central and Eastern United States through next week. Some places as far south as Florida could see their coldest temperatures in several years.
What meteorologists are watching:
“We’re pretty confident that a strong area of low pressure is going to develop along the East Coast sometime this weekend and then move to the north and produce widespread gusty winds,” said Frank Pereira, a meteorologist at the Weather Prediction Center on Tuesday. “Depending on where it develops and where it tracks will determine how much precipitation spreads inland, and what the precipitation type is.”
That uncertainty is not unusual at this early stage. Forecasters rely on a blend of weather models — computer simulations used to predict future conditions — and they are more confident in a forecast when most of those models are consistent with one another. The closer the storm is, the more confident forecasters become.
On Tuesday, the Weather Prediction Center said several of the major forecast models they rely on were in agreement that a powerful storm was likely to form along the East Coast this weekend.
More recent model runs, have trended toward a stronger system, increasing the potential for snow, damaging winds and dangerous ocean conditions. Newer forecast models that incorporate artificial intelligence have also supported this stronger storm scenario.
By Wednesday, the signals remained consistent, with some forecasters discussing the possibility that the storm could within the next 24 hours become a bomb cyclone — a rapidly intensifying system in which the central pressure drops by at least 24 millibars.
“This is the kind of pattern that would allow for it,” said David Roth a meteorologist at the Weather Prediction Center. He noted that the atmospheric ingredients were in place for the storm to strengthen quickly as it moves offshore on Saturday.
Even with growing agreement that the storm will intensify, Mr. Pereira said it was not expected to be as impactful as last weekend’s system, largely because this one will be confined to the East Coast. Still, he said that it could bring significant wintry weather back to areas that were recently hit, depending on its exact path.
“If it hugs the coast, then there’s a chance it will bring warm air in, to change the precipitation over to rain or a mix,” he said. “A little farther offshore will allow that cold air to stay in place and you get mostly snow. But also too far offshore and you will get less precipitation. It’ll just be windy with perhaps some snow on the backside of the system.”
On Tuesday, Mr. Pereira said a majority of weather models placed the storm in a “prime spot” offshore, a scenario that could bring heavy snow to parts of eastern South Carolina, North Carolina and into southeastern Virginia. He added that, because the storm is expected to be strong, high winds, large waves and coastal flooding were also possible.
“But it doesn’t take much in the change of track to change the outcome,” he said. “That’s why the uncertainty is so, so great.”
By Wednesday, Mr. Roth said the forecast remained “more or less identical to yesterday.” A moderate chance of snowfall was still expected across southeastern New England, along the Jersey coast and as far as south as northeastern Georgia. The highest likelihood of snow remained over southeastern Virginia and the Carolinas.
“We’re still talking about something that’s at least three days out,” he said. “but it’s heartening that the signal is more or less similar.”
Mr. Roth added that uncertainty persisted around snowfall potential in some parts of the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast, including New York City, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C.
One certainty: The cold will stick around.
Beyond the storm itself, meteorologists and local officials are also concerned about dangerously cold conditions. In the wake of the previous system, bitter Arctic air has spread across much of the central and Eastern United States, sending temperatures plunging as much as 30 degrees below average. Forecasters said these conditions could be especially dangerous in parts of the South, where hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses remained without power on Wednesday.
Another blast of Arctic air is expected to move from the Plains into the East and Southeast from Friday into Saturday, with the potential for record low temperatures as far south as Florida. Forecasters said some locations could experience their coldest temperatures in several years, along with the longest stretch of persistent cold in decades.
The combination of extreme cold and potential further winter weather from the next storm, Mr. Pereira said, is likely to result in prolonged cleanup efforts.
“Especially for areas that have already been impacted,” he said. “Any more snow at this point would not be helpful for sure.”
Nazaneen Ghaffar is a Times reporter on the Weather team.
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