Major ice storm threatens several eastern US states
By
Alex Sosnowski, AccuWeather senior meteorologist
Updated Feb 19, 2021 9:44 AM EST
An ice storm began Wednesday night into Thursday across parts of the East, and AccuWeather forecasters warn that some areas may end up with a heavy glaze of ice that can bring down trees and lead to widespread and long-lasting power outages in some communities.
Much of Virginia, North Carolina, West Virginia, Maryland, Delaware and southern New Jersey will beared the brunt of heavy ice accumulations.
"The storm in progress is actually a two-parter and will mean an extended period or second round of freezing and frozen precipitation from parts of the interior South to the Northeast," AccuWeather Chief On-Air Meteorologist Bernie Rayno said.
Rayno was referring to a double-barreled structure to the storm. One storm center brought locally heavy precipitation into Thursday afternoon in the mid-Atlantic. The second part of the system brought yet another pulse of precipitation Thursday night into early Friday.
There was a lull between the two storms where mostly drizzle occurred and temperatures even inched above freezing for a time in some locations on Thursday evening. However, as the second storm center rolls through, the atmosphere may cool enough so that another round of ice develops from parts of North Carolina to southern New Jersey. Precipitation across the northern part of this area may even transition from ice to accumulating snow.
The atmosphere has been stuck in repeat mode with the event at hand being the second storm in three days to produce a swath of snow and ice in frozen and powerless areas of Texas as well as several other South Central states.
"For parts of the interior South and lower mid-Atlantic region, this is the third storm system with ice since last weekend," AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Courtney Travis said.
"Portions of the Atlantic Seaboard had a period of freezing rain and sleet last weekend and again earlier this week," she added.
The storm from this past weekend was the colder of the two prior storms and unleashed a more extensive swath of ice, cutting power to hundreds of thousands in Virginia and North Carolina.
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AccuWeather forecasters say the storm system forecast to affect the region through Thursday night may be the biggest and baddest of the bunch in terms of impact.
A general 0.10 to 0.25 of an inch of a glaze of ice is in store from the southern Appalachians to the lower mid-Atlantic coast. Even heavier amounts within this zone of 0.25 to 0.50 of an inch with an AccuWeather Local StormMax™ of 1 inch could occur across portions of northern and western North Carolina, central and southeastern Virginia and the southeastern portion of Maryland and central Delaware. The threshold for trees and power lines coming down is anything near and above 0.25 of an inch.
As of the afternoon hours on Thursday, at least 180,000 homes and businesses were without power in the Eastern states, according to PowerOutage.US, although this figure pales in comparison to the more than 4 million that were without power in Texas alone earlier this week. By early Friday morning, that number had fallen to under 140,000 as ice tapered off and power crews began to repair downed lines.
Cities that received at least some ice included Greensboro, North Carolina; Charlottesville and Roanoke, Virginia; Dover, Delaware; Millville, New Jersey; and Washington, D.C.
There is the risk of trees crashing into homes and blocking streets and secondary roads. People that live in wooded areas are urged to remain vigilant.
Where sleet fell instead of freezing rain, fewer problems with downed trees and power lines occurred as sleet tends to bounce off these elevated objects and not weigh them down.
Officials are urging people to avoid unnecessary travel. Travel along portions of I-77, I-85 and I-81 in the region are likely to be icy and dangerous, even as ice ends.
Some sleet mixed in for a brief time as far to the northwest as southeastern Pennsylvania, central New Jersey, southeastern New York state, including in New York City, and southern New England.
Sleet can still pose significant challenges for walking and driving and can be difficult to remove, especially where freezing rain mixes in, which could act to glue down the mixture.
Even though the ice and snow are forecast to shut off on Friday and some melting could occur during the afternoon hours, it may take until Saturday until there is enough February sunshine to go to work on melting more of the ice.
Any natural melting that occurs on Friday afternoon and again on Saturday is likely to be followed by a freeze-up at night, unless roads and sidewalks are treated with a fresh round of ice-melting compounds.
Temperatures are forecast to trend upward later this weekend to next week over the region. By next Monday, many of the areas being hit with ice from the current storm can expect highs in the 40s with even warmer conditions on Tuesday.
Keep checking back on AccuWeather.com and stay tuned to the AccuWeather Network on DirecTV, Frontier and Verizon Fios.
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News / Winter Weather
Major ice storm threatens several eastern US states
By Alex Sosnowski, AccuWeather senior meteorologist
Updated Feb 19, 2021 9:44 AM EST
An ice storm began Wednesday night into Thursday across parts of the East, and AccuWeather forecasters warn that some areas may end up with a heavy glaze of ice that can bring down trees and lead to widespread and long-lasting power outages in some communities.
Much of Virginia, North Carolina, West Virginia, Maryland, Delaware and southern New Jersey will beared the brunt of heavy ice accumulations.
"The storm in progress is actually a two-parter and will mean an extended period or second round of freezing and frozen precipitation from parts of the interior South to the Northeast," AccuWeather Chief On-Air Meteorologist Bernie Rayno said.
Rayno was referring to a double-barreled structure to the storm. One storm center brought locally heavy precipitation into Thursday afternoon in the mid-Atlantic. The second part of the system brought yet another pulse of precipitation Thursday night into early Friday.
There was a lull between the two storms where mostly drizzle occurred and temperatures even inched above freezing for a time in some locations on Thursday evening. However, as the second storm center rolls through, the atmosphere may cool enough so that another round of ice develops from parts of North Carolina to southern New Jersey. Precipitation across the northern part of this area may even transition from ice to accumulating snow.
The atmosphere has been stuck in repeat mode with the event at hand being the second storm in three days to produce a swath of snow and ice in frozen and powerless areas of Texas as well as several other South Central states.
"For parts of the interior South and lower mid-Atlantic region, this is the third storm system with ice since last weekend," AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Courtney Travis said.
"Portions of the Atlantic Seaboard had a period of freezing rain and sleet last weekend and again earlier this week," she added.
The storm from this past weekend was the colder of the two prior storms and unleashed a more extensive swath of ice, cutting power to hundreds of thousands in Virginia and North Carolina.
CLICK HERE FOR THE FREE ACCUWEATHER APP
AccuWeather forecasters say the storm system forecast to affect the region through Thursday night may be the biggest and baddest of the bunch in terms of impact.
A general 0.10 to 0.25 of an inch of a glaze of ice is in store from the southern Appalachians to the lower mid-Atlantic coast. Even heavier amounts within this zone of 0.25 to 0.50 of an inch with an AccuWeather Local StormMax™ of 1 inch could occur across portions of northern and western North Carolina, central and southeastern Virginia and the southeastern portion of Maryland and central Delaware. The threshold for trees and power lines coming down is anything near and above 0.25 of an inch.
As of the afternoon hours on Thursday, at least 180,000 homes and businesses were without power in the Eastern states, according to PowerOutage.US, although this figure pales in comparison to the more than 4 million that were without power in Texas alone earlier this week. By early Friday morning, that number had fallen to under 140,000 as ice tapered off and power crews began to repair downed lines.
Cities that received at least some ice included Greensboro, North Carolina; Charlottesville and Roanoke, Virginia; Dover, Delaware; Millville, New Jersey; and Washington, D.C.
There is the risk of trees crashing into homes and blocking streets and secondary roads. People that live in wooded areas are urged to remain vigilant.
Where sleet fell instead of freezing rain, fewer problems with downed trees and power lines occurred as sleet tends to bounce off these elevated objects and not weigh them down.
Officials are urging people to avoid unnecessary travel. Travel along portions of I-77, I-85 and I-81 in the region are likely to be icy and dangerous, even as ice ends.
Some sleet mixed in for a brief time as far to the northwest as southeastern Pennsylvania, central New Jersey, southeastern New York state, including in New York City, and southern New England.
Sleet can still pose significant challenges for walking and driving and can be difficult to remove, especially where freezing rain mixes in, which could act to glue down the mixture.
Even though the ice and snow are forecast to shut off on Friday and some melting could occur during the afternoon hours, it may take until Saturday until there is enough February sunshine to go to work on melting more of the ice.
Any natural melting that occurs on Friday afternoon and again on Saturday is likely to be followed by a freeze-up at night, unless roads and sidewalks are treated with a fresh round of ice-melting compounds.
Temperatures are forecast to trend upward later this weekend to next week over the region. By next Monday, many of the areas being hit with ice from the current storm can expect highs in the 40s with even warmer conditions on Tuesday.
Related:
Keep checking back on AccuWeather.com and stay tuned to the AccuWeather Network on DirecTV, Frontier and Verizon Fios.
Report a Typo