Well folks, it's been quite a turn of events over the past 24 hours but it appears that the Northeast Coast is indeed going to be taking a good old fashioned Licking from Old Man Winter on Friday and Saturday.

This will be a spread out 36 to 48 hour event which will include the following...

-SNOW- UP TO 35 OR 40 CM IN SOME PLACES.
-WINDS GUSTING TO 90-110 KM/H ALONG THE NORTHEAST COAST.
-BLOWING SNOW AND ZERO VIABILITY.
-SNOW DRIFTS SEVERAL FEET HIGH IN PLACES.

BLIZZARD WARNING IN EFFECT FOR....
St. John's and vicinity
Avalon Peninsula North
Bonavista Peninsula.
Avalon Peninsula South.
Clarenville and vicinity
Terra Nova
Gander and vicinity
Bonavista North
Bay of Exploits.

THE TIME LINE
Overnight- St. John's and the Avalon will start to see Snow perhaps 2-4 cm by tomorrow morning. Winds will increase over night with North winds gusting to 60 km/h.

Morning-The drive to work will be a bit on the dicey side in the Metro area. Moderate Snow bands will be moving around that time with 1-2 cm an hour at times. North winds will already be gusting to 80 or 90 km/h by 8 or 9am. The Northeast Coast from Trinity Bay to Gander to the Bay of Ex. will start to see Light to moderate Snowfall around this time as well.

Afternoon- Steady moderate Snow bands will be rolling into the Northeast Coast in the early afternoon. Winds will really be gusting to 100 km/h now. The roads will really start to get nasty by early afternoon.
As the Afternoon wears on... some heavier Snow bands will start to push in.

Evening- Some of the heaviest Snow bands could drop as much as 3-5 cm per hour along the Northeast Coast as we move into tomorrow evening. With winds still gusting between 70 and 90 km/h in from the Northwest... you image how much Blowing Snow will now be a factor.

Overnight- Those heavier bands should start make way for moderate to light snow again after midnight. However the winds will still be gusting to 60 or 80 km/h overnight it will be a dirty night.

Saturday- The Snow will start to taper off on Saturday however another 5-10 cm isn't out of the question by the time we get to tomorrow afternoon. Especially up towards the Bay of Exploits.

SO HOW MUCH SNOW???

This is a tough call. Some of the models including the Canadian GEM are overdoing this thing, in my opinion. On the other hand, I think the GFS American model is under shooting a bit. So with that said here's my crack at Snowfall totals from Friday morning to Saturday Night.

LABRADOR COAST

This system will then start to pound the Coast of Labrador as we move into Sunday and Monday. Totals along the Coast could top out at 40 cm by the time we get to Tuesday morning.
More on this tomorrow.

Ryan