Snow falls on the Hellertown borough public works garage. (FILE PHOTO)
A developing coastal storm could bring the first accumulating snowfall of the winter season to the Saucon Valley area this weekend.
In a hazardous weather outlook statement issued early Friday, the National Weather Service said “snow showers or snow squalls may develop on Saturday and result in light snow accumulations through Saturday evening.”
“On Sunday, additional snow showers or snow squalls are possible, and may coat some roads with up to an inch of snow Sunday morning in parts of the Lehigh Valley, Pocono Mountains and into far northwest New Jersey, with the higher terrain more susceptible for an accumulation,” the NWS added.
The weather forecast website PA Weather Action called the meteorology behind the approaching storm “complex” and said that it is “exactly why we have observed such extreme differences with the latest model guidance.”
Forecasters originally expected the storm to brush coastal areas, depositing just a light dusting of snow, but more recent model guidance has the system tracking further west, bringing snow to inland areas such as Saucon Valley.
“We have two pieces of energy to keep an eye on, one piece of energy in the South and one piece diving out of the Midwest. How these two pieces of energy interact will determine exactly how much snow our area will see,” PA Weather Action reported in its latest forecast statement.
Their first call forecast calls for much of eastern Pennsylvania–including the Lehigh Valley–to receive 1 to 3 inches of snow, while points further east such as New York City and the Jersey Shore could receive as much as 7 inches.
