Near miss for us, but others brace for blizzard

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

The forecast for a historic blizzard has been there for days, looming over the nation’s capital like the UFO from “Independence Day.” Projected snowfall totals have ticked steadily upward, to the point where the National Weather Service – known for its conservative predictions – says more than 2 feet of snow could land on Washington.

Residents and elected officials throughout the Eastern United States are heeding the warning.

The Mahoning Valley, however, is not expected to be affected.

Eric Wilhelm, chief meteorologist for 21 WFMJ-TV, The Vindicator’s broadcast partner, said the Pittsburgh area may get hit with a few inches of snow and the Wheeling, W.Va., and Steubenville areas could see an inch or 2, but the Valley “won’t see a flake” from that storm.

States of emergency have been declared in five states and the District of Columbia. Schools and government offices are being closed pre-emptively. Thousands of flights have been canceled. Food and supplies are disappearing from grocery and hardware stores. College basketball games and concerts will have to wait.

“It’s going to be dangerous out there,” said Tonya Woods, 42, a Washington Metro station manager who lives in suburban Clinton, Md. “I say they should shut things down.”

On Thursday afternoon, she got her wish. The capital’s subway system announced that it will shut down entirely late Friday night and remain closed through Sunday for the sake of employee and rider safety. Underground stations usually stay open during major snowstorms.

The director of the National Weather Service said all the ingredients have come together to create blizzards with brutally high winds, dangerous inland flooding, white-out conditions and even the possibility of thunder snow, when lightning strikes through a snowstorm.

The snowfall, expected to continue from late Friday into Sunday, could easily cause more than $1 billion in damage and paralyze the Eastern third of the nation, weather service director Louis Uccellini sad.

“It does have the potential to be an extremely dangerous storm that can affect more than 50 million people,” Uccellini said at the service’s Weather Prediction Center in College Park, Md.

Washington looks like the bull’s-eye of the blizzard, and New York City is just inside the slow-moving storm’s sharp northern edge, which means it is likely to see heavy accumulations, Uccellini said. Boston will probably get off easy this time, forecasters said.

Weather Prediction Center meteorologist Paul Kocin, who with Uccellini wrote a two-volume textbook on northeast snowstorms, estimated more than 2 feet for Washington, a foot to 18 inches for Philadelphia and 8 inches to a foot in New York.

The snowfall could be as heavy as 1 to 3 inches per hour, and continue for 24 hours or more, Kocin said.

That could put this snowstorm near the top 10 to hit the East, with the weekend timing and days of warning helping to limit deaths and damage, said Kocin, who compared it to “Snowmageddon,” the first of two storms that “wiped out” Washington in 2010 and dumped up to 30 inches of snow in places.

Unfortunately, more than just snow is coming. Uccellini said it won’t be quite as bad as Superstorm Sandy, but people should expect high winds, a storm surge and inland flooding from Delaware to New York. Other severe but nonsnowy weather is likely from Texas to Florida as the storm system chugs across the Gulf Coast, gaining moisture.

At a supermarket in Baltimore, Sharon Brewington stocked her cart with ready-to-eat snacks, bread, milk and cold cuts. In 2010, she and her daughter were stuck at home with nothing but noodles and water.

“I’m not going to make that mistake again,” Brewington said.

The Mid-Atlantic region is notorious for struggling to cope with winter weather, and a light dusting on Wednesday night served as an ominous prelude to the massive blizzard.

Less than an inch of snow was enough to immediately turn roadways treacherous in the District, Maryland and northern Virginia, causing hundreds of accidents and leaving drivers gridlocked for hours. President Obama wasn’t spared, as his motorcade slowly weaved and skidded along icy streets to the White House.