Rain/snow showers this evening; weekend system grazes the region

Rain showers are changing over to snow as cold air ushers in behind a front this evening. Any accumulation this evening will be generally be light. Temperatures will make a dramatic drop into the evening, likely reaching the 20s before midnight in many areas. Lows start out in the teens and low 20s early Friday.

FRIDAY

The same front that stalls along the coast will be the highway for several areas of low pressure Friday into Saturday. Models have come into better agreement that the storms will remain along the coast with very little impacts to Southwest Virginia. This may end up being one of those events where we get missed, with the heaviest snow toward the coast. This trend will keep the highest snow totals along the Interstate 95 and 85 corridors, but much lighter snow showers may reach areas along the Hwy 29 and 501 corridor across the Southside.

THE WEEKEND

If the storm happens to take a slight jog back to the northwest, areas across the Southside may get a Trace to 1″ or so of snow. Any precipitation would occur from late Friday evening to sunrise Saturday. Many locations may never see a single snowflake with the early weekend event.

MUCH COLDER WEATHER

Behind the coastal storm, it remains cold and breezy with highs only in the 20s and 30s for most areas over the weekend with lows in the 20s and teens. Very little melting will occur with anything that does melt refreezing at night.

Next week, a gradual warming trend early in the week will give us two days near average MON-TUE before another cold front ushers in colder temperatures for the second half of the week.