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GOOD MORNING UPSTATE SNOW NATION! It is great to be awake and ALIVE this morning! For one thing, seeing a good part of the state NOW OPEN is making me SMILE 🙂

This will actually get a little bit better. Before. Well. You know what’s coming the second half of this week and into next weekend. We won’t get into that. Yet. We have some more light snow with some lake effect trying to hold on this afternoon especially off of Lake Ontario.

This will move in and move out quickly. Just a little bit of accumulation, if any in these areas off of Lake Ontario. But you know how it is in January. You could think nothing and end up with 6″ in a heartbeat! The next snowfall event, the greater one that will impact the region as a whole is expected during the day tomorrow! You get to go back to work and to school with snow coming down. Again! In the morning Western NY into Central NY gets involved in it.

Later in the afternoon and into the evening tomorrow, the snow races across the state, tapering off in Western NY first then in Central NY. By 7 PM most of the snow west of I-81 is OVER. Meanwhile in the Capital Region and Eastern NY including the Hudson Valley, this is your GO TIME for the snow, the PM commute.

As this storm moves on out, it will leave a mark on Upstate NY. A big one? Nope. This is just a typical clipper system. Will it be a record snowfall? NOPE. NOT EVEN CLOSE. Will it be enough to shovel and possibly snow blow? PROBABLY.

Next up we have the the system Tuesday Night and into Wednesday Morning. By this point in time, the temperatures are borderline. If anything from Syracuse south and west, they are above freezing and into the rain territory. Even at night. Expect some disruptions on the Wednesday morning commute.

After this point it gets warmer. Temperatures climb through the 30s. Then into the 40s. For several days. This is the point in the middle to end of the week that snowfall, particularly in Western NY, the Southern Tier, Finger Lakes and Central NY will take the biggest hit. It will also take a hit across the rest of the state but nowhere near as bad as south and west of Syracuse.

Friday afternoon and evening will be the warmest time period with 40s to possible low 50s in play. That’s not record territory but it is up there. Over the weekend we will see changes starting Saturday as a cold front will move on through and by one week from today on 1/11, we should be at least back to normal or close to it with a return to snow. The 8-14 day forecast for next week clearly reflects this trend for the worst of the January thaw to be that 4 day period middle to end of this upcoming week. Next week is better.

Is it slightly above normal? Why yes it is. Don’t worry about it though. Normal temperatures are near their lowest points for the entire year. Even in the lower elevations, normal is a 32 degree day now. So only SLIGHTLY above normal means maybe mid to upper 30’s at best. That would slow any melting to a trickle.

Stay tuned tomorrow. I will have the latest on the THAW and anything else coming our way!