This winter is going to seem awful, but it actually won't be that bad.
So says AccuWeather.com senior meteorologist Jack Boston, who produces long-range forecasts for the weather service.
The first half of the season will not be as harsh as the second half, but forecasters are expecting a steady stream of winter storms to make their way up the East Coast over the next three months.
"This is going to be fairly close to an average winter, but after what we had last winter ... it's going to seem to be pretty nasty," Mr. Boston said.
Overall, forecasts show the average temperature for the next three months will be about 6 degrees colder than last year.
"That being said ... last winter, the average temperature was 5½ degrees above normal," Mr. Boston said.
December
Mr. Boston said Tuesday's storm, a manageable nuisance, will likely be the last snow the region sees until mid-December. Over the entire month, though, about 7.5 inches is expected.
That measure will leave the area under about half a foot more snow over the course of the month than it was last year, though that is ultimately still "right around normal in December," Mr. Boston said.
January
The real struggle will be from the middle of January on, Mr. Boston said.
"And that's important, because people are maybe going to get lulled into, 'Oh, this isn't so bad,' " he said.
Over the month of January, the area could see as much as 20 inches of snow, which would be about 6 inches more than an average winter. Compared to last year's 3.9 inches, "it's going to seem a little more like winter," Mr. Boston said.
February
Meteorologists are forecasting February to be the worst month of this winter, with as many as four storms hitting the area.
In a month where 9.6 inches of snow is the norm and last February only brought 3.3 inches, the 15 to 20 inches forecast could make it "the harshest month of the winter," Mr. Boston said.
On top of the snow there will, of course, be the cold - which meteorologists expect to be an average of about 8 degrees colder than last year.
"So February's going to seem like a real wintry month. But January's not going to be any slouch, either," Mr. Boston said. "That's not extreme by any means, but it's just more like what we would expect in a winter in Northeast Pennsylvania."
Contact the writer: domalley@timesshamrock.com, @domalleyTT on Twitter