Forecasters Eyeing 'Significant' Winter Storm For NJ

Forecasters are warning of a potential "significant" winter storm that could dump widespread snow on the Garden State.

"While it remains way too early though for specifics, and there likely will be further trends and changes among model guidance, there remains some signal for some sort of storm for the second half of the weekend," National Weather Service forecasters said in a Wednesday morning update.

If a storm does develop, it would strike on Sunday.

The storm "has the highest potential to be impactful across our region including the potential for an accumulating widespread snowfall," National Weather Service forecasters said.

There are multiple factors needed to have significant snowfall, according to the forecast.

"There are a lot of pieces to the puzzle that would have to come together at the right time for a major storm to unfold and bring heavy snow late this weekend to early next week," AccuWeatherMeteorologist Brandon Buckingham said.

A significant piece, the National Weather Service and AccuWeather agree, is the lack of cold air before the storm.

"The amount of cold air in place ahead of this storm and especially during it will be important when it comes down to precipitation types and amounts as well if a storm were to track close enough, as strong dynamics may also come into play," the National Weather Service said.

Another important factor is the storm's track.

"If the storm travels well inland of the coast, it will pull too much warm air into the I-95 zone for snow and might even make it too warm for an all-out snowstorm from north and west of I-95 to the Appalachians," AccuWeather said. But if it taps into enough cold air and tracks off the coast, it could mean snow for the northeast.

However, forecasters warned that it is too early for specifics, and things will become clearer as we get closer to Sunday. Patch will share updates as they become available.