About 240 million people were under cold weather advisories and winter storm warnings Saturday as a powerful system threatened to bring howling winds, flooding and heavy snow to the East Coast.
About 240 million people were under cold weather advisories and winter storm warnings Saturday as a powerful system threatened to bring howling winds, flooding and heavy snow to the East Coast — including blizzardlike conditions stemming from a “bomb cyclone” in the Southeast, a forecaster said.
Greater Boston was largely spared from the wintery onslaught, as local meteorologists predict a slight warm-up over the first half of the week to maybe around 32 degrees during the day time before dropping into the 20s again in the second half. Emily McMinn, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service’s Norton office, tells the Herald that overnight temperatures will remain “pretty brutal” and rarely rise above the low teens.
Western Massachusetts, including most of Franklin, Hampshire, and Hampden Counties, as well as portions of northern Connecticut, is less lucky. The NWS issued a cold weather advisory for the region on Saturday as meteorologists see temperatures as low as -5 degrees and windchill as low as -15 degrees.
As for snow, Cape Cod and the Islands are expected to see the worst of it in Massachusetts, with 1 to 3 inches predicted to begin falling midnight Sunday and getting heavier in the day, McMinn said. Parts of Nantucket could see four inches.
While that maritime snow could dust the Plymouth and Gloucester areas, McMinn said she doesn’t expect much accumulation there.
