National Weather Service United States Department of Commerce

Winter Weather Continues in the Northeast; Frigid Temperatures for the Central and Eastern U.S.

The major winter storm will continue to impact the Northeast U.S. today with heavy snow as it shifts away from the East Coast. Frigid temperatures will impact the eastern two-thirds of the U.S. this week, and numerous record lows are forecast. Sub-zero lows are expected nearly every morning from the Northern Plains through the Ohio Valley and into the Northeast. Read More >

Event Overview

Cold core low moved over the area, dragging along a weak and slow moving surface low pressure. While weak, sufficient low level and upper forcing aided in developing strong to severe storms. While instability was more than sufficient, the shear was lacking, but was enough to help develop a few supercell thunderstorms. Due to the weak forcing overall and the slow moving nature of the storms, some storms anchored over locations for an extended period of time, resulting in Flash Flooding. Some repeated storms over the same area also led to similar results. Severe weather reports were mostly in the form of hail, as these storms produced hail very efficiently. Some hail reaching 1.5", with some isolated reports of damaging winds. 

 

This event not only impacted the area on 8/19, but due to little movement of the system as a whole, repeated events were seen the following day, on 8/20. Storm action generally hovered over counties along and east of the Mississippi River on the second day. 8/20 was filled with many mini supercells, where many led to funnel clouds. Along with the funnel clouds, some reports of brief tornadoes were received. 

 

 

Image
Surface Map on August 20th
nws logo Media use of NWS Web News Stories is encouraged!
Please acknowledge the NWS as the source of any news information accessed from this site.
nws logo