Good Wednesday afternoon to everyone, winter weather continues to impact the Carolina region as a storm system has now transitioned to off the South Carolina Coastline. A weak low in the Gulf Coast Region slid east and delivered some light snow this morning. It was enough to produce a trace to 1/2 inch of snow along and north of Interstate 40 before ending around noon.
With our new transition to off the Carolina coast, a deformation band has developed which stretches back to our far southeastern counties of Cleveland and Lincoln. Once you get into central North Carolina from roughly a line from Greensboro to Sanford and ENE to Elizabeth City, a nice winter storm is underway and could dump several inches of snow in that part of the state.
Here in western North Carolina (outside of the mountains) the snow from this event is mostly over. Attention now lies to the overnight hours and first thing Thursday morning. Just how much moisture will be left on the roadways? That will help determine if we begin to see black ice develop overnight. Temperatures are projected to drop down into the mid-to-upper 20’s across the region.
Northwest flow kicks in late tonight which may bring back some snow showers in the mountains, a few of those could break containment into the I-40 corridor around daybreak…or at least guidance suggests that. We’ll see.
Regardless its going to be a very cold and windy day as temperatures will struggle to get much above freezing tomorrow. Wind chills for all lower elevation areas could be in the teens/lower 20’s as well. Not cold enough for Cold Weather Advisory criteria but for sure not a day to be outdoors for much length of time. The mountains will be well below freezing tomorrow with wind chill values going below zero for some.
The cold air will persist through the early part of the weekend before a significant warmup occurs next week. The region looks to return to 60+ degree weather by mid next week, the final week of February and Meteorological winter.
