Winter Storm Warning for Friday, Feb. 25

Batten down the hatches--a real winter storm is coming to the Berkshires. You will awake to snow on Friday.

Today will be a seasonably pleasant day with breaks of sun and highs around freezing. Cloud cover will be more extensive this afternoon in advance of this sizable storm.

Meteorological experts over in Albany have upgraded our Watch to a Warning. Eight to 12 inches of snow is expected, with the heaviest amounts--1 to 2 inches per hour--coming down during the morning commute. Travel between 6 AM and 11 AM will be, at the very least, difficult.

NWS Albany thinks we'll get sleet.

NWS Albany still has the Berkshires in the sleet zone. Not only will sleet bring our snow totals down some (6-7 inches), but it will also make shoveling the snow less than ideal.

The only other slight change to the forecast that we've seen is the start time of the storm. It's now looking like it will be closer to 3 AM, which means snow will still be falling during the Friday night commute. If you have weekend travel plans and are hoping to wait out the storm before you drive anywhere, the roads should be slow but passable by 6 or 7 PM on Friday.

Here are some maps for your pre-storm enjoyment:

The Weather Channel, well-known for its hyping of storms, has eastern Berkshire County in the jackpot zone (12+).

Channel 13 coming in with a solid forecast.

Solid but nothing fancy here from Channel 6 in Albany. The pink/magenta/burgundy scheme is a curious choice.

Channel 22 has not changed their map from yesterday. Three possibilities: 1) They're lazy (unlikely). 2) They're going to update later today (more likely). 3) The model runs have been so consistent there's really no need to change (true).

Pivotal Weather's blend of models. This is our pick for its accuracy potential.