Spring Storm Threatening New England With 18 Inches of Snow

A late-season storm rolling out of the US Midwest threatens to dump more than a foot of wet, heavy snow on northern New York and New England starting Wednesday night, with parts of New Hampshire and Maine at risk of getting as much as 18 inches, according to the National Weather Service.

“Some areas could approach their April snowfall record,” said Marc Chenard, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service. “As we get into spring, there’s more moisture to work with, and it’s cold enough. It’s that combination that’ll give the heavy, wet snow.”

The combination of wet snow, a high snow load and strong wind gusts could result in tree damage and power outages, according to the NWS’s Weather Prediction Center. Prolonged onshore winds late Wednesday into Thursday will likely cause some flooding along parts of the Northeast coast, it said.

The storm has already piled snow on the Great Lakes region and is beginning to wind down there, with a foot falling around some parts of Marquette, Wisconsin, Chenard said. About 106,000 customers in Wisconsin had no power at midday on Wednesday, according to PowerOutage.us.

The same storm system also battered West Virginia on Tuesday with thunderstorms and heavy winds, with about 94,000 homes and businesses still without power as of Wednesday afternoon. The storm knocked over trees and damaged the electric grid in 1,300 different locations, including broken and damaged poles and transformers, plus spans of wire on the ground, according to utility American Electric Power Co. unit Appalachian Power.

Top photo: Roads following a day of snow in Bartlett, New Hampshire on Jan. 17.