Wednesday, December 24, 2025
Happy Christmas Eve! We have been in one of the coldest Decembers on record and are being gifted with a mild Christmas holiday today and tomorrow. Then, reality comes back as the edge of a cold air mass from the North will barely get through Central Maryland. It will be a shallow layer of cold when the next weather event arrives with warmer clouds. The net result is the concern of sleet and freezing rain.
An important point worth mentioning: Ground Temperatures! The ground may still be warm, and the expected afternoon timing of the event may limit icing to elevated surfaces while most roads stay wet. But not all. There are other details to explore below.
We will have more swings as the warm-up with rain Sunday night into Monday will be followed by a new arctic air mass just before the New Year!
A lot to unpack in this report.
Gusts may reach 45 mph this morning, then ease this afternoon.
Look at the spread again in our region!!
30s in northern Pennsylvania, while 60s to the South in Virginia.
WESTERN MARYLAND
Wind is still in full force in this region. A fresh coating to a few inches of snow has blanketed the region.
This webcam is positioned at The Greene Turtle Deep Creek Lake and shows Wisp Resort, including a zoomed-in view of Squirrel Cage, The Face, the terrain park, Boulder, the mountain coaster, the tubing park and a shot of McHenry Cove at Deep Creek Lake!
Yesterday: Low 38°F; High 43°F
Precipitation: 0.02″
Season Snow Total: 2.0″
Snow Depth: 0″
Top Wind Gust: 13 mph
Sunrise at 7:24 AM
Sunset at 4:49 PM
Normal Low in Baltimore: 28ºF
Record Low: 4ºF in 1983
Normal High in Baltimore: 45ºF
Record High: 71ºF in 2015
Rainfall Deficit at BWI
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Mild with some rain showers. Not a concern!
Look at the spread again in our region!!
Spotty rain showers.
The storm track is focused across the Northern USA, with warm air to the south and cold air pushed by a Blocking High in Eastern Canada into New England.
How far that cold air reaches is important, and it looks like it just barely makes it through Central Maryland.
The weather system we are watching will track along that boundary between the warm and cold air. A large region of snow and ice across the Great Lakes will expand to the Mid-Atlantic and New England.
The complication with a layer of warm air into the clouds while cold air hugs near the ground.
The DEPTH of cold air will determine if rain can freeze to ice pellets (sleet) or remain rain and then freeze on contact with the ground (freezing rain). Both are icy! Sleet is tiny balls of ice, freezing rain is just a layer of glaze that is smooth and more slippery.
As Low Pressure and precipitation move in, a layer of cold air will hold close to the ground. The net result will be a large region where rain will fall and freeze on the way down to the ground. That is where the sleet and freezing rain will fall.
NOTE: Ground temps in our region may remain warmer in Central Maryland, closer to the Pennsylvania line, and north could be cold enough for ice to form and affect travel.
Even if roads stay wet near you, elevated steps, bridges, along with trees and powerlines, are susceptible to ice building up.
This is a 6-hour summary between 1 PM and 6 PM
Lingering freezing drizzle in Southern PA with lingering light snow across metro New York and New England.
This could be a more serious problem in the Maryland mountains, suburbs north of Baltimore, and across Pennsylvania, where 0.25” to 0.50” ice is possible.
After the ice event, a warm-up over the weekend will surge ahead of the next cold front.
Rain develops later Sunday and may be heavy overnight to Monday morning. This will be along a cold front with arctic air flowing in behind.
Thunder is possible with the downpours.
Arctic air will be in place before New Year’s Eve!
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In case you missed it, click this image for brief summary of the final snow totals from the last event.
In case you missed it, click this image for brief summary of the final snow totals from the last event.
Click here for the full report
This was issued October 9, as expected: A weak and short-lived event to start winter may play a different role this winter.
These are NOT all the same caterpillar!
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I am aware there are some spelling and grammar typos and occasional other glitches. I take responsibility for my mistakes and even the computer glitches I may miss. I have made a few public statements over the years, but if you are new here, you may have missed it: I have dyslexia and found out during my second year at Cornell University. It didn’t stop me from getting my meteorology degree and being the first to get the AMS CBM in the Baltimore/Washington region. One of my professors told me that I had made it that far without knowing and to not let it be a crutch going forward. That was Mark Wysocki, and he was absolutely correct! I do miss my mistakes in my own proofreading. The autocorrect spell check on my computer sometimes does an injustice to make it worse. I can also make mistakes in forecasting. No one is perfect at predicting the future. All of the maps and information are accurate. The ‘wordy’ stuff can get sticky. There has been no editor who can check my work while writing and to have it ready to send out in a newsworthy timeline. Barbara Werner is a member of the web team that helps me maintain this site. She has taken it upon herself to edit typos when she is available. That could be AFTER you read this. I accept this and perhaps proves what you read is really from me… It’s part of my charm. #FITF
