Year-End Arctic Chill Persists; Ice and Snow Loom from Florida to Maine- Henson and Masters

https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/year-end-arctic-chill-persists-ice-and-snow-loom-florida-maine
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One of the warmest years in U.S. history ended with one of the coldest blasts ever recorded east of the Rockies for the week between Christmas and New Year’s. Even though 2018 is now under way, the cold isn’t gone—and an explosively intensifying storm along the Gulf Stream will double down on the misery for millions along and near the East Coast.

On Tuesday morning, sleet pellets and snowflakes were peppering coastal areas near Houston (which had its warmest year on record in 2017). The unusual spritz was triggered by a surge of jet-stream energy diving into the cold upper trough that’s kept the eastern two-thirds of the nation in the deep freeze for more than a week. As this upper-level impulse pulls across the Gulf of Mexico, light freezing rain could fall late Tuesday night into early Wednesday as far south as southeast Georgia and the elbow of the Florida Panhandle, where a rare winter storm warning was in effect. Amounts should be light enough to avoid widespread power loss and tree damage, but roadways could be quite hazardous. The ice may be capped with an inch or two of snow as far south as Georgia.

WU weather historian Chris Burt looks back at some of the Southeast's most spectacular winter weather events—including the colossal FL/GA/SC snow of 1800 and the New Orleans blizzard of 1899—in this archival post from 2011.