Snow and freezing rain could make for icy roads in Massachusetts Tuesday, weather forecast maps show
Welcome to March. Unfortunately, the weather forecast for Boston is picking up right where February left off.
Temperatures on Monday are about 15 degrees below the average and we are also tracking another round of wintry mix for Tuesday.
This will not be a major storm on Tuesday, more of a nuisance-level event.
Snow, ice and rain forecast for Tuesday
We expect the precipitation to arrive as snow around midday.
Daytime snowfall in March usually struggles to stick unless it is coming down hard or temperatures are well below freezing. Neither of those will be true on Tuesday. Snowfall will be light to moderate and temperatures at the ground level will be in the low to mid 30s.
Therefore, we don't expect much snow accumulation on roadways, mainly just adding a frosting to the existing snow piles.
As milder air moves in aloft, the snow will quickly change over to ice and rain by late afternoon on Tuesday.
Precipitation will be mainly rain across eastern Massachusetts during the evening commute.
Freezing rain concerns
We are slightly concerned about some freezing rain west of Route 495 Tuesday evening, especially in the elevated areas of Worcester County.
Temperatures in these areas are likely be right around 30-32 degrees.
The rain will continue most of Tuesday night, tapering off around dawn on Wednesday.
The freezing rain will gradually give way to plain old rain overnight in the higher elevations.
All in all, we expect about .5" to .75" of total precipitation (mostly in the form of rain).
If the rain doesn't completely wash away any new snow (which it likely will), the mild temperatures on Wednesday surely will. We expect highs near 50 by Wednesday afternoon.
What's next in the weather forecast?
We will have another wintry mix situation Thursday night into Friday. Snow is a bit less likely with this system but we will have to watch for the risk of more freezing rain.
More on this as we get closer.
