With 19 million people under winter alert and thousands already struggling with several feet of snow and accidents on dangerous roads, a clipper system is expected to cover the Midwest, Great Lakes, and Northeast with snow on Wednesday.
The system will provide brief snowfalls that may manifest as snow squalls, which are particularly hazardous for road travel because of limited visibility and whiteout conditions.
According to the National Weather Service, a clipper storm, often called an Alberta clipper, is a system that moves out of Central Canada and brings snow and cold air to the United States.
New York City may also see some light snowfall on Thursday morning along the I-95 corridor. There won’t be any buildup in the five boroughs.
Lake effect snow will return Thursday, particularly downwind of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, and persist into Friday behind the clipper storm.
Through Friday, the Tug Hill Plateau region near Lake Ontario may receive up to two feet of fresh snow, while areas downwind of Lake Erie could receive an additional six to eighteen inches.
In certain areas of the Northeast, dangerous snow and ice have already accumulated, wreaking havoc on highways and causing roofs to collapse due to a fatal winter blast.
Following several feet of snowfall that caused traffic jams and school closures, the county of Erie, Pennsylvania, issued a state of emergency last week.
Due to a significant accumulation of snow, the roof of Sparkle Clean Car Wash collapsed on Tuesday morning. There was also a multi-vehicle collision on Tuesday due to squall and whiteout conditions, which resulted in a huge backlog of semi-trucks on the county’s I-90. On Monday, a semi-truck became stopped on snowy rails at a cross in Erie after colliding with a cargo train. Just in time, the driver managed to exit the taxi.
In other news, a weather-related tragedy in Washington County, Iowa, on Monday morning claimed the lives of three persons. According to the Iowa State Patrol, an automobile attempted to avoid a snow plow and crossed into oncoming traffic, colliding with another vehicle and killing the driver and one passenger on impact. A fourth was admitted to the hospital.
Additionally, 73 million people from the upper Midwest and the Appalachian region, including the cities of Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C., are under wind alerts Wednesday. Sporadic power outages might result from strong wind gusts of 45 to 55 mph through Thursday.
A fresh surge of arctic air from Canada is also expected to bring further chilly temperatures, with temperatures dropping 10 to 20 degrees below normal over the following two days.
Thursday morning, wind chills will be below zero throughout the Great Lakes and the northern Plains to the Midwest. Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia are among the Southeast states that may experience below-freezing weather.
The Midwest will get significantly milder temperatures by the weekend, while the North and Southeast will see much milder temperatures early next week.
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