National News

So There’s Something Called a ‘bomb cyclone’ Winter Storm Heading Up the East Coast

It’s about to get icy

Updated: 9am January 4th, 2017

Snow and wintry mix swept in from the Atlantic last night, stretching from northeastern North Carolina to the coast of Maine. Schools up and down the east coast are closed today due to snow and unsafe conditions.

In Massachusetts alone, 657 different schools have been closed or delayed due to the expected 16 inches of snow around the Boston area, including Boston College, Boston University, Harvard, Northeastern, and the University of Massachusetts Boston.

CNN is reporting that “by week’s end, Boston and part of New Hampshire will be colder than Mars.”

In New York, there are 325 school closings this morning, including New York University and Fordham University. Columbia and Cornell remain open.

Light snow also coated the streets of the Triangle in North Carolina this morning, totaling only 1.5 inches, and Duke University, North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill will all remain open Thursday afternoon.

The heaviest snow in North Carolina was southeast in the Wilmington area, which got nearly 4 inches, enough to close the University of North Carolina Wilmington until Friday.

In the past week, the east coast of the U.S. has been experiencing bitter cold temperatures, but now even nastier weather is on the way. A winter storm —aka Grayson — that some forecasters are calling a “bomb cyclone” because of its low pressure and strong hurricane-like winds, is expected to hit mid-week.

“First, a monster storm will hammer coastal locations from Georgia to Maine with ice and snow. By Thursday, the exploding storm will, in many ways, resemble a winter hurricane, battering easternmost New England with potentially damaging winds in addition to blinding snow,” according to the Washington Post.

“This could be one of the heaviest one-day snowfalls on record in both Savannah, Georgia, and Charleston, South Carolina,” the Weather Channel reported. The storm has potential to do severe damage to the southern coastlines, causing power outages and tree damage.

All day Thursday meteorologists are going to be glued to the new GOES-East satellite watching a truly amazing extratopical "bomb" cyclone off New England coast. It will be massive — fill up entire Western Atlantic off U.S. East Coast. Pressure as low as Sandy & hurricane winds pic.twitter.com/6M4S3y75wT

— Ryan Maue | weather.us (@RyanMaue) January 2, 2018

Is your school in the Boston area? If so, your town is expected to get up to a foot of snow, intensifying late Thursday morning.

“This is a three-headed monster with the snow, the wind and coastal flooding. The concern with this storm is the incredible winds and bitter cold,” said Channel 7 Boston meteorologist Jeremy Reiner.

Frostbite, hypothermia and power outages are serious concerns all across New England. At least 11 people have died this week due to frigid cold across the country.

If you go to school in Boston or any of these threatened areas, be prepared to bundle up. Here are some tips and tricks on how to prepare for a winter storm.