It’s not quite Buffalo, but snowflakes could fly in Philly on Friday evening
Philly will be spared the squalls, but not the January-like cold.
Philly’s seasonal totals will remain about 4 to 6 feet lower than Buffalo’s, but the region could experience its first “trace” of snow Friday evening.
Late in the afternoon, a band of precipitation had popped up between the Baltimore-Washington area and Harrisburg, and appeared to be heading toward the Philly region with a mix of rain and snow, and flake sightings were reported in Chester County around 6 p.m.
“We could definitely see our first trace this evening,” said Ray Martin, meteorologist with the National Weather Service. A trace, by the way, is defined as an official weather service observer witnessing at least one flake in the vicinity of the official station at Philadelphia International Airport.
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This happens to be Snow Squall Awareness Week in Pennsylvania, and squall warnings were in effect in the central part of the state Friday afternoon.
It’s possible that areas well north and west of the city might see one. But Martin says don’t look for them in the immediate Philadelphia area, and certainly not in Center City.
“I don’t know that there will be the squally-type stuff,” he said.
The rain and snow would be kicked off by an upper-air system moving east from the Ohio Valley, and it will yield to quite a cold weekend.
Temperatures Sunday are expected to get no higher than the mid-30s, making it the coldest day since March 28.
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By then, about 6 feet of snow likely will have landed upon parts of the Buffalo area, or more than the average seasonal total around here.