The National Weather Service (NWS) has provided an update on today’s heavy rain that is expected to change over to snow Monday morning.
Per the NWS, “Rain will change to snow later this evening over the mountains before spreading east toward the metros early Monday morning. Highest snowfall totals will be confined to mountains where upslope snow showers will continue through Monday afternoon.” Earlier today we released the first “Pencil Prediction” school closings and delays- it can be seen here.
It’s important to remember that temps are at about 60° today and aren’t expected to drop to freezing overnight. That means that if snow is heavy enough, it would likely only cause a slushy coating for a very short amount of time. The NWS is not calling for a lot of snow, with less than an inch expected for most of the DMV and slightly more possible in the “reasonable worst case” map (1-2 inches across the area). Both of those maps are available below.
To put things into perspective, there is about a 40-50% chance across the county to see a tenth of an inch of snow or more and about a 20-35% chance to see an inch of snow or more (maps below).
People tend to see what they want to see when it comes to weather reports, but in this situation the most likely scenario is that a little extra caution might be necessary during the morning commute. As always, things can be a little worse than expected or there could be absolutely no snow at all. We’ll continue to monitor and have updates for you.
