January Banter 2026

[George BM]

Sunday, January 18, 2026 8:58AM EST

Shallow layer of very cold air will continue to undercut the warm/moist environment overhead. As temperatures fall into the lower 20s as we go through the morning, showers and thunderstorms will begin to overspread the region owing to an approaching shortwave with decent elevated CAPE (MUCAPE 250-500+ J/kg). As this elevated convection overspreads the region torrential rain falling into the lower 20s surface temps will efficiently freeze on all untreated surfaces allowing for significant icing.

Freezing showers and thunderstorms will continue into the afternoon. Precip will change over from freezing rain to sleet from NNW to SSE as the sub-freezing layer becomes deeper allowing for upwards of 2 to 4 inches of sleet on top of the significant ½” to 1” of ice accretion. The ice accretion itself will lead to widespread power outages. Temps will fall into the teens as we go through the afternoon and into the evening. There will be a lull in the precip by the mid evening hours as the first shortwave moves to the ENE. But the next one will be right on its heels.

The second and more life-threatening shortwave will approach the region by the early morning hours of Monday. Precip will overspread the region from SW to NE between 4am and 8am starting off as snow briefly along and north of I-66 and Route 50 before changing over to sleet as we go through the morning hours. Once again, elevated instability will be plentiful owing to unusually warm and humid air over the SE US overrunning the very cold lower-levels of the atmosphere here w/ MUCAPE upwards of 500+ J/kg again. As we reach the early afternoon hours showers and thunderstorms will really start training over the same areas, generally the Greater DC and Baltimore metros. Surface temps will rise into the 19-23F range. But with very warm air just of the surface, precip will change over into freezing rain. This is when the truly historic destruction may occur with ice accretion rates in excess of ¼ to ½” per hour over the course of the afternoon into the evening. By nightfall, many areas may have received an additional 1.5” to 3” of ice accretion leading to universal power outages and tree damage with many structures also experiencing significant damage.

Precip will exit the region by midnight with skies remaining overcast as we go towards dawn on Tuesday.

This will be a historic and life-threatening event that will affect many aspects of life locally over the next several days or few weeks.