A bomb cyclone is affecting many across the United States this morning. The monster storm system has brought power outages, busted water pipes, heavy snow and flooding to much of the eastern United States. The outbreak of arctic air is affecting many people in the U.S. this morning from the Rocky Mountains all the way down to southern Florida.
The low pressure system that is affecting the United States right now dropped 30 millibars in pressure between 7 p.m. Thursday night and 7 p.m. Friday night which is classified as a bomb cyclone.
The arctic air blast cleared the Gulf coast and the Atlantic seaboard yesterday and brought cold air to the entire eastern U.S. The minimum temperature since midnight is shown below. Notice that single digit temperatures made it all the way to northern Georgia!
One of the bigger factors in this storm system has been the strong winds that have accompanied the cold air outbreak. There are wind chill warnings this morning stretching from North Dakota to Alabama due to bone-chilling wind gusts.
Wind chills below zero have stretched all the way down to central Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi. The wind chill map this morning shows that many places in the Great Plains, Midwest, and Northeast are experiencing dangerous wind-chill values colder than -20°F.
Another major aspect of this storm system has been the wintry precipitation. There will be many places that experience a white Christmas this year as this storm system brought accumulating snowfall to the Pacific Northwest to the southeast and into the Great Lakes region.
While this storm system did not bring major snowfall accumulations for most, the blowing snow has been a massive issue in many parts of the country with near blizzard-like conditions occurring yesterday and today.
When will conditions begin to improve?
Unfortunately, the temperature for Saturday and Sunday will continue to be very cold. Saturday will feature high temperatures in the upper single digits with wind chills from -20 to -30°F especially in the morning. The wind will begin to wind down later on tonight, but wind chills will still be in the -10 to -20°F range.
Sunday, the high temperatures will warm into the mid-teens and the wind will be calmer. However, wind chills near zero degrees and below will still be possible throughout the day. There could be a few peaks of sunshine tomorrow as the storm system starts to pull out of the area.
There is some good news on the horizon, however, as a warming trend will start during the second half of the work week. Temperatures will rise to around 40 degrees on Wednesday and then into the mid to upper 40s for Thursday and Friday which is around 10-15 degrees above average for this time of year.
Right now, it appears there could be another storm for New Years Eve and New Years Day. However, the Valley will likely be on the warm side of this storm which will mean rain as opposed to snow.
