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It’s been many, many years since NC has experienced a winter snow of this magnitude this early in December.  This storm promises to make it a December to remember.

As has been widely advertised, there are going to be heavy snows to the west, rain to the south and east and a battle zone that should line up fairly close to a line from Raleigh to Charlotte where the forecast is super complicated and the weather super messy. I can hear the bemoaning of the infamous “line” as I type.  There are some interesting numerical modeling disagreements ongoing behind the scenes that hopefully will be resolved soon, but in the larger picture here are a couple of key points:

• There will be a lot of moisture available for this system.  Liquid equivalents will run about 2″ for most along and south of the Triangle and Triad with amounts tapering to an inch along the Virginia border.
• Heavy snows of 12 to 20″ will be common in places like Greensboro, Hickory, Boone, Asheville where most of the moisture comes in the form of snow with little mixing.
• The zone to the south and east, in places like Burlington, Chapel Hill, Salisbury and Concord, should probably expected half snow, half sleet and a little freezing rain.
• The next zone to the south and east has Durham and Raleigh and Charlotte.  I expect a mixed bag of it all…something like 3-6″, 1-2″ of sleet and 1/4 of freezing rain.  Remember that west and north in these zones you are more likely to skew to snow.  For instance, Durham may get 6″, Raleigh may only get 3 or 4″.
• Remember that whatever snow you get will be compacted by any sleet falling on top of it.  So, you could measure 6″ pre-sleet and shrivel down to only 3″ afterwards.
• IMPORTANT: The impacts of this event will be high and widespread no matter what form the frozen stuff on the ground is.  And after you get a couple inches, it’s really all the same in terms of impacts.  It just takes longer to go away with more of it there when it’s over.
• Something to watch will be the extent of the freezing rain.  If the warm nose penetrates farther north and west and deeper than is currently thought, significant ice accrual could become a real problem.
• Timing:  this looks to arrive from south to north overnight tomorrow.  For Raleigh, perhaps in the 1-3am timeframe.

As always, stay tuned as we monitor the latest trends and I will update as necessary.