A nice afternoon of sunshine lies ahead, but blustery conditions will continue. Temperatures are going to remain in the lower to middle 30s in southern areas. The mountains will see readings in the 20s.

A cold night will lead us into a nice sunny Tuesday. It won’t be very warm tomorrow, but at least the stronger early March sunshine could melt some snow in south-facing areas.

Another weather system is going to move north into the Great Lakes area on Tuesday night and Wednesday. This will drag milder air northward. There is also moisture with this system, but not much.

Quick-Hitting Weather System

Tuesday night’s system isn’t a big storm. Generally, a few inches of snow will fall – perhaps 1 to 3 inches in most areas with maybe 4 inches showing up in isolated locations.

The timing of this system is overnight Tuesday and early Wednesday morning. I think the bulk of the precipitation will be over before 7 a.m. Wednesday.

It will be mild Wednesday afternoon with some areas nearing 35 degrees. Although I think there will be some wind Wednesday, it will be a good day to go skiing and enjoy the snow.

On Thursday a new weather system will pass south of Maine. The only result will be to drag  more arctic air into the region. By Friday morning, it will be near or below zero again. We are getting very close to the final days of widespread below-zero weather. If you look at the averages for March, the record lows start to more frequently rise above zero, meaning it becomes more difficult to reach zero after the end of this week.

I can’t tell you 100 percent if this is the final below-zero outbreak, but there definitely won’t be more than one or two.

Cold and Snow This Winter

I love statistics and there have been a lot of them this winter. One of my favorite two charts are from the folks at the Eastern Regional Headquarters of the National Weather Service. They have put together a summary of all the snow not only for last month, but for the entire snow season so far.

Notice how much above average so many climate sites are across the Northeast. It’s amazing that some cities and towns have seen two full years of snow in one season!

February was also very cold. In Portland, this was the coldest month ever recorded including the older records from downtown. Using that data, this was the coldest month since 1934.

The pattern is slowly breaking down. There are subtle changes starting to occur in pressure patterns over the Pacific, which should eventually start leading to more seasonable temperatures in the Northeast. Those temperatures will still be interspersed with the below-average ones we’ve been getting, so I still believe there is little doubt March and the first part of April will be colder than average and a late spring is almost a sure bet.

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