Tuesday marks the first day of spring, but Old Man Winter is taking a parting shot, as a winter storm bearing down on the D.C. region threatens to dump between four to eight inches of snow overnight, with some areas expecting as much as six to 10 inches.
Winter Storm Toby, the fourth nor’easter to hit the area in less than three weeks, will bring potentially one of the heaviest snowstorms this late in the season along parts of the I-95 corridor, and is expected to spread snow as well as wind and coastal flooding along the East Coast through Thursday.
In addition, the wet snow and gusty winds could contribute to power outages and tree damage in parts of the Northeast, with the National Weather Service calling for snow or rain to affect a narrow zone in the mid-Atlantic and central Appalachians, including Philadelphia, Baltimore and at least the northern and western suburbs of the D.C. metro.
However, the greatest chance for any accumulating snow during the daytime will be west and northwest of the Interstate 95 corridor from southern New Jersey and southern Pennsylvania to northern Virginia.
NWS also predicts that on Tuesday night, snow will fall from the upper Ohio Valley to the Appalachians and into the mid-Atlantic region, including D.C., Baltimore, Philadelphia and at least parts of the New York City Tri-State area.
The DC Snow Team said it is fully deployed, with more than 200 heavy and light plows pretreating all National Highway System, primary, secondary and residential routes within the city.
Locally, Pepco’s Emergency Response Organization is prepared, and all available personnel are standing by to restore service for customers as safely and quickly as possible.
In addition to 150 internal linemen, Pepco has 250 overhead line contractors and 180 tree crew personnel ready to support customers across its service area.