Around social media, you may have seen a few wild snow maps predicting 1-2 feet of snow for New England, and even a few inches of snow for Boston.
Well, that’s where your friendly meteorologist comes in. Part of our job is to filter out the noise and give you one quick glance at the most accurate forecast for snow.
As good as models are, there are still biases (toward trending colder, and therefore more snow, for example). Not to mention some snow maps are geared toward the typical 10:1 snow ratios (10 inches of snow to 1 inch of rain). Add in springtime and we have lots of other fun factors to contend with, unlike in the wintertime.
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So with a spring snowstorm, we know the sun angle makes a difference to cut down on ice or snow potential making it to the ground. And if the precipitation falls during the daylight hours (which in spring there is more of compared to winter), then that cuts down on snow totals too.
Real true cold arctic air is hard to come by during April. So that also means a slushier snow (6:1 ratio) versus fluffy stuff (14:1), again leading to lower overall snow totals.
That’s a taste of what we’re up against to get a late season snow to actually ring true around Cape Cod, or Boston.
Sorry snow lovers in southern New England. This storm is another messy, yucky, mostly cold and windy rain. Again, we have to go up north in the mountains where ski areas will indeed see 1-2 feet of snow through the end of this week as the storm stalls in the Gulf of Maine through Saturday.
