A wet, unsettled change arrives across the region, with rain tonight and Friday, followed by a colder pattern. Higher terrain has the best natural-snow potential: Snowshoe, Beech Mountain, Sugar Mountain, Canaan Valley Resort, Timberline, Wisp, Seven Springs, and Hidden Valley see recurring snow showers or rain/snow through the weekend. Snowshoe and the North Carolina mountains turn notably colder, with daytime temperatures mainly in the 20s and 30s and overnight lows in the 20s.
Lower elevations and areas nearer Washington, Baltimore, and Philadelphia will be warmer and wetter, with mainly rain and only limited rain/snow chances. Liberty Mountain, Whitetail, Roundtop, Massanutten, Wintergreen, and eastern Pennsylvania resorts trend mostly dry after Friday, though temperatures cool into the upper 20s and low 30s at night. Those colder overnight periods may provide potential snowmaking windows, especially in the higher mountains, while gusty winds and fog could affect operations.
Weather Fact of the Day
At very high elevations, snow can fall from a cloudless-looking sky as **diamond dust** -- tiny ice crystals that form directly from water vapor in extremely cold, nearly saturated air. In Antarctica and the Arctic, these crystals can create halos and shimmering light pillars around the sun or lamps, even though no conventional snow cloud is overhead.
DCSki regional outlook based on National Weather Service forecasts for Mid-Atlantic ski areas.
