The National Weather Service in Huntsville says the Tennessee Valley, including the Huntsville area and the Shoals, could be in for a winter emergency starting as soon as Friday night. A cold front from the north combined with moisture coming up from the Gulf of Mexico could lead to roads left impassible by snow and ice. NWS forecaster Todd Barron Another concern is power outages due to electrical lines damaged by accumulating ice.
“Whenever we get this ice build up on the power lines, that can really weigh it down and then mix in with some some stronger winds are going to be coming up later this weekend too,” Barron said. “It could spell a disaster for some utility issues as well.”
NWS forecasters suggest North Alabama make preparations now.
That includes having enough food, water, and medications on hand to carry them through the weekend. The temperatures are expected to start dropping around 6 p.m. Friday night. That means ice accumulations could build up later that night, making some roads too dangerous for driving. The concern over power outages is linked to a possible loss of heating. Forecaster Todd Barron says alternate forms of staying warm are fine, so long as everyone uses them safely…
“Fire heaters are fine. The you know, the portable fire heaters, as long as they're, you know, safe and secure, fine,” Barron said. “We ask people not to use their stove to heat up their house. A lot of major issues that we have with that. I'm sure any fire marshal will tell you not to not to do that either, but just make sure that you are prepared, not just with the food side, but then the potential for maybe even a long term power outage.”
Wintry conditions are expected to extend as far as into Monday night and into Tuesday. Barron explains that even if the snow stops falling, it will take warmer weather to melt any slippery accumulations and make road safe for driving. That, he says could take into Tuesday or so, depending on temperatures.
Residents of central and southern Alabama appear to have less to worry about. A wintry mix may hit the Birmingham and Tuscaloosa areas over the weekend. The lows in the Mobile area could reach the mid twenties Sunday and Monday nights.
Alabama’s approaching cold snap is part of a major winter storm that’s expected to bring ice and snow to a massive stretch of the country this week, from Texas into the Northeast. In the meantime, frigid Arctic air will continue to freeze parts of the Midwest, Great Lakes and Northeast.Forecasters say that air comes ahead of a storm that will hit much of the Southeast and East Friday through Sunday.The National Weather Service says to expect snow, sleet and freezing rain from the southern Rockies and Mid-South before heading east.Dangerous travel conditions and power outages could cause problems.
With many Americans still recovering from multiple blasts of snow and unrelenting freezing temperatures in the nation’s northern tier, a new storm is set to emerge this weekend that could coat roads, trees and power lines with devastating ice across a wide expanse of the South.
The storm arriving late this week and into the weekend is shaping up to be a “widespread potentially catastrophic event from Texas to the Carolinas,” said Ryan Maue, a former chief scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
“I don’t know how people are going to deal with it,” he said.
Forecasters on Tuesday warned that the ice could weigh down trees and power lines, triggering widespread outages.
“If you get a half of an inch of ice — or heaven forbid an inch of ice — that could be catastrophic,” said Keith Avery, CEO of the Newberry Electric Cooperative in South Carolina.
The National Weather Service warned of "great swaths of heavy snow, sleet, and treacherous freezing rain” starting Friday in much of the nation’s midsection and then shifting toward the East Coast through Sunday. Temperatures will be slow to warm in many areas, meaning ice that forms on roads and sidewalks might stick around, forecasters say.
The exact timing of the approaching storm — and where it is headed — remained uncertain on Tuesday. Forecasters say it can be challenging to predict precisely which areas could see rain and which ones could be punished with ice.
An extremely cold arctic air mass is set to dive south from Canada, setting up a clash with the cold temperatures and rain that will be streaming eastward across the southern U.S.
“This is extreme, even for this being the peak of winter,” National Weather Service meteorologist Bryan Jackson said of the cold temperatures.
When the cold air meets the rain, the likely result will be “a major winter storm with very impactful weather, with all the moisture coming up from the Gulf and encountering all this particularly cold air that’s spilling in,” Jackson said.
