What to Do When You’re Feeling Nervous About an Upcoming New England Snowstorm

Obviously, I'm not a meteorologist or even experienced at tracking storms professionally, so take the following with a grain of salt, but I AM a nervous nelly, and I've always found news coverage of snowstorms and other inclement weather events to be stressful as can be! You too?

Here's a weather hack: I figured the best way to feel less anxiety about supposed "crippling blizzard" coverage was to educate myself! #Knowledgeispower right?

​First, ever gotten on an airplane on a grey/gloomy day only to see glorious sunshine once the plane rises above the clouds? It's kind of a magical thing to see that puts it all in perspective.

So moisture builds in cloud formations at the lower levels of the atmosphere; these systems generally have travel trajectories based on a jet stream (or directional air flow, usually west-east) that is of low or high pressure. Lower pressure makes it easier for other atmospheric factors to direct a storm or "moisture cloud" system if you will and hence generally allows for warm air to rise from south of the equator up thru the U.S. and other parts of the northern hemisphere.

Naturally, high pressure tends to trap the cold from the north and travel with it. It's when these two air flows trade off and meet with storm clouds that systems dump rain or snow based on the season.

So take a look at this weekend: there is a low pressure system set to trade off over the weekend with a high pressure system from the north as storm clouds move thru indicating for most forecasters we should get a major snow storm. High pressure is the key factor and that system that is moving south from upper territories is moving slower than was expected even earlier in the week.

What was at first to be the coldest NFL game in history Sunday is now expected to be 30 degrees warmer than first anticipated. Look for snow, expect half what they are predicting.

At least that's my best guess....