MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Snow, ice, rain, and maybe even a thunderstorm: Accuweather’s Elliot Abrams predicts Wednesday morning’s weather could be one giant mess in North Central West Virginia.
“It’s starting to look like this is actually going to be a bigger flood threat than a snow threat, because we could get an inch and a half of rain from tomorrow morning to tomorrow evening,” Abrams said on WAJR’s Morgantown AM. “What should happen first is very late tonight there will be some snow and sleet. Could make things very slippery for a while, but then it should quickly warm up above freezing and toward 40, and then it’s going to pour for several hours. Might even be a thunderstorm.”
The temperature will be hovering right around freezing, maybe even slightly above, during the Wednesday morning commute. The National Weather Service in Pittsburgh estimates some parts of the region could receive up to 0.2 inches of ice.
“It gets warmer tomorrow morning just as the heaviest precipitation is coming in,” he said. “We could have the equivalent of about an inch of rain tomorrow or even two inches, and that can lead to flooding. But, if we got at least a portion of that as ice, that’d be a big problem early in the morning.”
Essentially, Abrams said, it could be a giant mess — or it could just be very wet and rainy. That presents another set of problems for afternoon and evening commuters.
“It will come to an end in the afternoon,” he said. “Then suddenly it will freeze up tomorrow night, but the question is whether all the wet areas drain away or we have lots of puddles and water standing around and it’ll be cold and icy Thursday morning.”
Some snow is expected, but Abrams said most of that accumulation will occur north and east of West Virginia.
“Right now, it doesn’t look like it’s going to be a snow storm.”
Abrams said commuters should leave plenty of extra time for themselves
“Could be slippery for the morning commute because it’s going to be below freezing for a while tonight and then rising in the morning,” he said. “But it should have changed already to rain, and then it’s going to pour in the morning and midday and come to an end in the afternoon.”
A winter weather advisory goes into effect at 2 a.m. Wednesday morning and is set to expire at 8 a.m.