A wavering storm track on Saturday night had the National Weather Service changing forecasts through the evening, but still managed to leave some snowfall in Lincoln County, according to reports.
The inclement weather, and the changing forecasts, were due to a major storm that had already struck southern and mid-Atlantic states and was passing offshore of Maine during the evening hours of Saturday. Changes in the storm track could have brought heavy snowfall, or clear skies, depending on whether the system slid to the west or east.
As it happened, the storm did pretty much what the National Weather Service originally forecast it to do: skirt the Maine coastline and leave a coating to several inches of light, fluffy snowfall, with coastal areas getting the most accumulation.
The NWS forecast began to change on Saturday afternoon, when a winter weather advisory was issued for 4 p.m. through 2 a.m. on Sunday. The projected totals were increased from earlier forecasts, from 1-3 inches up to 3-6 inches.
Snow began to fall in Lincoln County in the late afternoon hours and continued to fall steadily, but without the intensity required to fulfill the NWS projections.
At 8:01 p.m. the NWS updated the advisory, calling for a reduced accumulation of 2-4 inches.
At 9:25 p.m. the forecast was scaled back again to the original projection of 1-3 inches. There was an exception: Monhegan Island, the eastern-most community in Lincoln County, reported 5 inches of snowfall Sunday morning, according to a spotter for the NWS.
Radar images monitored at intellicast.com during the event indicated that the heaviest bands of snowfall remained just offshore of Lincoln County, impacting nearby coastal areas in north Penobscot Bay and Down East.
Snowfall began to move out around midnight Saturday. The winter weather advisory remained in effect until 2 a.m. Sunday.
