The New Jersey region has a good chance of getting hit with an “impactful winter storm” this weekend, but big questions remain about the storm’s track, whether the storm will bring significant snowfall totals, or whether rain will mix in and keep snow accumulations low.
That’s the word from the National Weather Service’s main forecast office in the Garden State, which continues to monitor the potential storm.
The agency says the consensus among the many computer guidance models it uses shows that snow probabilities have increased significantly during the past day or so.
There’s now a 70% to 90% chance of 2 or more inches of snow and a 60% to 80% chance of 6 or more inches for areas south of Philadelphia.
For counties in far southern New Jersey, the chances of a half-foot of snow are 80% or more.
However, the snow probabilities have gradually decreased for New Jersey’s northern region.
The weather service says the probability of 6 inches of snow, or more, are in the 40% to 60% range for areas northwest of Interstate 95.
This graphic shows the probability of 6 inches or more of snow from a weekend winter storm that might hit the New Jersey region late Saturday, Jan. 24, through late Sunday, Jan. 25.National Weather Service
Precipitation from the winter storm system would likely begin Saturday night and continue through Sunday night, potentially lingering into Monday depending on the system’s speed, forecasters said.
Since the key pieces of energy driving this storm are still thousands of miles away, it remains too early to have confidence in specific snowfall amounts for any given location, the weather service said Tuesday afternoon.
Forecasters from AccuWeather say New Jersey could get substantial snow from the weekend storm, but it’s also possible the snow will be limited by rain, sleet or pockets of dry air.
“Some locations on the colder side of the storm could receive 6 to 12 inches of snow or more, where sleet, rain or dry air is limited,” AccuWeather said in its latest forecast report.
Frigid air lingers
In the meantime, bitterly cold conditions will continue to grip New Jersey through Wednesday, with dangerously low wind chills Tuesday night before temperatures moderate briefly midweek.
Tonight will be particularly dangerous, with low air temperatures dropping to between zero and 10 degrees across the state as arctic high pressure settles overhead and winds diminish.
Wind chills will dip into the low single digits before winds calm later tonight, though the National Weather Service notes that actual air temperatures in sheltered areas could fall even lower.
Wednesday will bring a brief respite from the bitter cold as high pressure moves offshore and southerly winds develop, allowing high temperatures to reach the 30s to low 40s across the state, particularly across the coastal plain.
Thursday will be even milder, with highs climbing into the low and middle 40s as warm air advection increases ahead of an approaching system.
However, the extended forecast takes a dramatic turn Friday into next week as a prolonged period of subfreezing temperatures returns to New Jersey.
An arctic cold front will move through Friday, with near-freezing highs that day followed by plummeting temperatures Friday night into Saturday.
Saturday morning lows will drop to the single digits to around 10 degrees at the coast, with daytime highs likely remaining in the teens, accompanied by gusty west-northwest winds that will produce wind chill values below zero.
A reinforcing shot of arctic air will follow Sunday night into Monday behind what is likely to be a storm system moving off the East Coast. But temperatures will be slightly less severe, with highs in the 20s and lows in the single digits inland to the lower teens at the coast.
Current weather radar
