Shawdesh Desk:

There is plenty to discuss in our forecast as we look ahead through the holiday weekend and into next week including a risk for a snowstorm either over our area or just to our southeast, the coldest wind chills of the season, and lake effect snow for the North Country.

Before we get to specifics, here is a look at your holiday weekend forecast:

Your holiday weekend outlook across the immediate CNY area

The system that you see passing through Saturday afternoon into Saturday evening should provide for mostly wet snow mixed with rain for lower elevations with mostly wet snow over higher elevations. The best chance for any accumulations worse than some slush would be the Tug Hill Plateau and the Adirondacks.

Now, let’s get to our next big weather makers:

Our next weather makers

All week long, I’ve been tracking the threat for a snowstorm passing either well southeast of our area, possibly over our area, or somewhere in between.

Looking ahead to Sunday afternoon into Sunday night, I’ve made preliminary snowfall impact potential maps.

Here are the maps across our local area & across the Northeast:

Snow impact potential across much of Upstate NY

Snow impact potential across much of the Northeast

You may notice that there is a sharp gradient between low to medium to high to very high impacts across sections of Central and Eastern New York and Pennsylvania.

Part of the reason why there is uncertainty is that the system that will affect us is still a long distance away.

See below:

The “x” marks the spot where the system that will create a snowstorm somewhere over the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast

In addition, it has to traverse over two mountain ranges including the Rockies and the Appalachians.

When that occurs, computer models typically have trouble figuring out exactly how to develop them.

We will be carefully monitoring the development of this system throughout the weekend.

Regardless of what happens to that snowstorm, the coldest temperatures and wind chills of this season is on the way late Monday night into Tuesday morning and potentially again late Tuesday night into Wednesday morning.

Latest information tells me that we should expect wind chills generally as low as -10 to -15 degrees (below zero). Some spots may approach -15 to 20 degrees below zero.

Important frostbite reminders (on exposed skin) so you can make empowered decisions about being outside:
–You can get frostbite in 30 minutes when the wind chill is -20 degrees (below zero).
–You can get frostbite in 20 minutes when the wind chill is -30 degrees (below zero).
–You can get frostbite in 10 minutes when the wind chill is -40 degrees (below zero).

We do expect at least a “cold weather advisory” to be issued. This is the replacement for a “wind chill advisory”. Regardless, the meaning is the same.