From flooding and landslide concerns in California to day after day of snow and ice in the mid-Atlantic and Northeast, the week of Valentine's Day is going to be a stormy messy one.
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00:00John, we are getting a welcome break, but it's always with mixed benefits here this
00:06time of the year, because we need the moisture, we just don't want too much of it too fast.
00:10Well, that's the key thing.
00:11We need the rain, so that's welcome, but the problem is when the rainfall comes too fast
00:15and too furious, that's our concern with this storm system.
00:19Later this week, AccuWeather was sounding the alarm about this concern all the way back
00:23to last week, well ahead of all other known sources, because we want people to be best
00:28prepared and to be positioned to stay safer.
00:31That's what we do here at AccuWeather.
00:33The concern is that, look at this atmospheric river, look where it's pointed, right at Southern
00:37California, right at the areas that have had these devastating wildfires, and that's a
00:42big concern, because rainfall coming at a rate of a half an inch to an inch or more
00:47per hour is enough to result in very serious flooding concerns, especially in those burn
00:53scar areas around the Los Angeles metro area.
00:56So that's a big issue here across Southern California as we head toward Wednesday night
01:01into Friday.
01:02And John, how much rain are we expecting overall?
01:04Well, with the atmospheric river pointed in this direction, think about this kind of like
01:09a fire hose of atmospheric moisture being delivered right to the California coastline,
01:15a widespread area of two to four inches of rain in the Los Angeles basin, and the higher
01:21elevations down towards San Diego, one to two in downtown San Diego, but look at the
01:25higher elevations near Los Angeles, some of those areas where those burn scars are
01:30occurring, four to eight inches of rain possible, and again, not only just the amount of rain,
01:35which is substantial, the biggest storm this winter season, this wet season across Southern
01:40California, but it's also how fast that rain's going to occur, and now all of the, there
01:46may not be much in the way of, in the burn scar areas, and that's why the concern about
01:51debris flows and mudslides is very significant, and this can escalate to a life-threatening
01:56emergency in those areas very quickly.
01:58That's why we want people to be prepared.
02:00Let me think about anybody downhill of some of the burn scars, Pasadena, specifically
02:04downhill of Altadena.
02:06So John, this storm system has traction, and it's going to cross the whole nation here
02:10into the weekend.
02:11Well, we've been talking about this February frenzy of storm after storm every few days
02:16in some parts of the central and eastern United States.
02:18Look at the future radar as we head toward Saturday.
02:21We're talking about that same storm pulling toward the Great Lakes, snow to the north
02:25in the blue.
02:26There's going to be some ice across Pennsylvania and more snow across the interior portions
02:31of the northeast.
02:32This one looks like it's going to be mainly rain, though, along the Interstate 95 corridor.
02:36Of course, we've got a couple of storms to go before we even get there, but the point
02:39is this is a cross-coast-to-coast storm.
02:42And you mentioned there are a couple of predecessors here that may not be coast-to-coast storms,
02:46but the next one up here, tomorrow into Wednesday morning, this is a storm that's still in its
02:51formative kind of infant stages here into the plains.
02:55We've got some ice in the forecast for the interior of Mid-Atlantic.
02:57Sure do.
02:58Significant icing concern right along the 81 corridor, Roanoke to Blacksburg, and further
03:03to the north, this is a big snowstorm across the Mid-Atlantic here.
03:07So Washington, D.C., over toward Baltimore, and also Philadelphia, we're going to be dealing
03:12with rapidly worsening travel conditions just in time for the evening commute and
03:18a little bit afterwards in those cities.
03:19A strip of 6 to 12 inches of snow, Washington toward just north of Richmond, Virginia, and
03:27some of that snow is going to come down 1 to 2 inches per hour.
03:29Big travel troubles on the way, and even some accumulating snow up in the New York City
03:35area where we're forecasting 2 to 4, especially the further south you go, the higher totals
03:40in the New York City metro area.
03:42So down toward Staten Island, for example.
03:43And John, the number to beat here, if we're looking for the biggest storm of the season
03:46so far for D.C., I think 6.8 inches was the one-day total from, what, January 6th or so.
03:53So this could be similar to that, maybe, do you think it exceeds it?
03:56It's going to be a real close call.
03:57I think we'll make a run at it there, but the higher snow totals can be just south of
04:02D.C., Lawdon and Falkier counties, for example, in northern Virginia.
04:06And then just briefly, John, we've got more coming behind that one.
04:08In between the two storms we highlighted, we highlighted the Tuesday, Tuesday night
04:12storm, we highlighted the weekend storm, but there's another sandwiched in between.
04:16Big storm coming up through the midsection of the country here Tuesday night into Thursday.
04:22Snow to the north.
04:23Look out.
04:24Chicago over toward Des Moines and Omaha, significant snow in that area, likely 6 inches
04:29of snow or thereabouts, maybe a little bit more, especially north of Chicago.
04:33And then we'll be dealing with some snow in the interior northeast going over to ice in
04:37those areas as well.
04:39So another big mess as this travel troubles persists.
04:42Great time to download the AccuWeather app, WinterCast, an excellent tool for you to help
04:46track every storm on the way.
04:48All right.
04:49We'll be digging into that, and I'll have more details on that storm as well.
04:52AccuWeather Chief Meteorologist John Porter.
04:54Thanks again, John.