At least some light snow just prior to and during the upcoming weekend

Most of the rest of the country has enjoyed a round of impressive spring warmth, but Northern New England, which is sometimes the last place to get warm, missed much of the much-above normal temperatures. The highest readings in this nearly 10-day stretch of relative warmth was back on March 10th where it climbed to near 50 degrees and thus, much of the deep snow cover remains over Vermont, even as it melts rapidly across the Great Lakes and Mid-Atlantic states. The melting will now be further slowed as the pattern supporting the relative warmth is replaced by a postitive-PNA jet structure beginning now.


 Still, even with the slow advance of spring in New England, one can feel winter's intensity begin to wane. Much colder air and a few inches of fluffy snow on Tuesday is certainly wintry, but temperatures will stay above the zero-degree line this go round and rise into the 20's during the day. Conditions will be mainly dry Wednesday and Thursday and part of Friday. Moisture in the activated southern branch of the jet stream will allow a weather system to develop off the Mid Atlantic Coast on Friday. This combined with a southeastward advancing clipper system will try and brig snow back into the region just prior to and during the Spring Equinox weekend. Its a little early for exactitudes and there is some upside with the Friday system if it can track farther and west though right now it looks like only a side swiping few inches. The clipper will mark the advance of some very chilly late March temperatures and I expect at least a few inches by late Saturday. Though Friday's temperatures might sneak above the freezing mark, Saturday's should stay in the 20's and will then subsequently fall off into the teens Sunday as a Polar Vortex (spring version) sweeps through Quebec.


Below freezing temperatures but dry weather then prevails in the Monday-Wednesday March 23-25 period though readings could warm back above freezing by late in the week. The strong ridge across western North America is expected to weaken by the weekend of the 28th and 29th and the weather pattern will respond by turning more variable. The days just prior to the weekend could feature a precipitation producer of some sort though mild air will begin to compete for control of the region by then so I can't guarantee snow. Though El Nino has proven to be a rather minimal factor this winter, the pattern in front of us, through perhaps early April may exhibit some El Nino characteristics with the aforementioned activated southern branch of the Jet Stream. I wouldn't mind one more good late-season southern branch humdinger as a grand finale but there is no hard evidence of such an occurrence yet.