ATLANTA — We are just hours away from a winter storm hitting North Georgia.
The system bringing the storm developed over Texas and Oklahoma earlier in the day Thursday and is expected to arrive in Georgia in the early hours of Friday.
Severe Weather Team 2 is updating the timeline and impacts throughout the evening, on Channel 2 Action News.
A winter storm warning has been issued for all of North Georgia and is set to take place starting at 5 a.m., which got pushed up by two hours late Friday night.
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“In general, the message is still the same,” Severe Weather Team 2 Chief Meteorologist Brad Nitz said. “The significant impacts will be from snow, sleet and freezing rain.”
Nitz said the far North Georgia mountain will see mainly snow and some sleet from this storm.
“I expect we’re going to get some, if not all of it, across the metro, making travel difficult, if not impossible,” Nitz said.
TIMING OF THE STORM:
The air will continue to cool throughout the night and will be below-freezing by early Friday morning.
The storm will start to cross over from Alabama into West Georgia starting around 4 a.m.
[INTERACTIVE: StormTracker 2HD Radar]
Between 5 a.m. and 6 a.m., the storm will move its way into the Atlanta metro with temperatures right around freezing.
As we head through the morning, around 10 a.m. we will start to see accumulating snow in metro Atlanta, especially the northern half of the metro and into the North Georgia Mountains.
The south metro will likely see a wintry mix with the temperatures hovering around freezing.
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“I do expect some snowfalls there in the morning, but then we’ll have more of a wintry mix as we head throughout the day,” Nitz said.
As we head into the afternoon, sleet and freezing rain lifts up to the north.
“So, across the metro area, accumulating snow early, especially in the northern half,” Nitz said. “We’ll start to mix in a bit of freezing rain. We’ll get some melting and compaction. We’ll have some areas where we’ll have white on the ground to start and then melt away before freezing, getting icy.”
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Nitz said in the afternoon, the North Georgia mountains will see more snow and sleet, and little if any rain or freezing rain.
By about 11 p.m. Friday, the storm starts to taper off and move out of Georgia.
WATCHES AND WARNINGS:
A winter storm warning has been issued for north Georgia and Clay County, N.C. in our viewing area starting Friday morning.
A winter storm warning is in place for Cleburne County, Ala. and a winter weather advisory has been issued Randolph County, Ala. in our viewing area.
RELATED STORIES:
- Winter storm warning now in effect for north GA
- CLOSURES: What GA school districts are canceling, moving to virtual learning for winter weather?
- Grocery stores work to keep shelves stocked as metro Atlanta preps for winter storm
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