Good evening everybody, Winter is about to take another bite this weekend, after which we should get another respite like we’ve had this week, so we’ve got something to look forward to – after more snow, wind and cold from Saturday to early Monday. For tonight, we’re back into the single digits for lows, and then low to mid 20s for highs tomorrow, with maybe some upper 20s in the southern valley.

Partly sunny skies on Friday will trend mostly cloudy with clouds thickening during the first part of the night. Lows will dip into the upper singles to mid teens as snow showers arrive around or after midnight.

Our Clipper system will dive southeast into central New England and look to redevelop south of Rhode Island.

However, as this happens, we’ll see onshore flow develop with a coastal front forming and pushing west towards far northeast CT and eastern CMass.

At the same time, a powerful Arctic cold front will be racing towards the NY/VT-MA-CT state line, and we’ll also have another convergence boundary setting up *somewhere* in southern New England.

All this to say, we could get some stronger snow bands to form both over the western high terrain (southern Greens, Berkshires, Litchfields, western hilltowns) due to the cold front, and another areas of stronger snow in central MA down into northeast CT.

So while most of us should see 1-3″ of snow (with a few valley areas maybe even just getting a healthy coating), there may be some 3″+ amounts in those high terrain areas, up to 5″ or so if they really come together.

Saturday morning is snowy, and that should last into about mid-afternoon before we taper off by late afternoon, at which point northwest winds are going to pick up and gust 25-40mph overnight Saturday into Sunday morning as temps drops like a rock.

This post was mainly about the snowfall piece, but suffice to say, given that Extreme Cold Watches are up EVERYWHERE, we could see extremely cold lows pushing down toward -20º in some parts of far northwest MA or SVT with wind chills down to -35º or so by early Sunday morning with blowing and drifting snow from our mostly light Saturday system.

Sunday will feature highs in the single digits mostly, and Sunday night will drop down to -10º or so, with less wind.

In closing, be sure to have plans ready to keep your pipes from freezing (if that’s in your control), and be ready to get pets back inside after doing their business, protection of livestock, and cover up any exposed skin as frostbite and hypothermia is a real risk in these types of conditions.

Have a great night!