A bomb cyclone is the name given to a low pressure zone that drops 24 mb in pressure in 24 hours. Basically it is a winter hurricane. It tracks up the Atlantic coast like a tropical depression, turns in a counter clockwise rotation pulling cold air from the land out over the ocean picking up moisture and then depositing that moisture back on the land in the form of rain or snow.
They used to call them a “noreaster” because of the direction they track. This one had a much larger pressure drop than past storms. The current dip in the jet stream allowed very cold air to be pulled into it creating snow in places like Savannah, Charleston, Raleigh that would have normally received rain in past similar storms.
The other conditions in place were the timing of an abnormally high tide because of the recent full moon. This combined with the 30-70 mph winds coming in from the ocean caused coastal flooding in places that had not seen it in decades.
I live in southern NH about 60 miles inland. We got about 10-12” of light snow that came down sideways with 20 -30 mph gusts. However, because the temperature was in the high teens it did not stick to any trees. Therefore, very few power outages. This was a concern because it is supposed to be -10 tomorrow night.
All schools were closed yesterday. Most had a 2 hour delay and reopened today. My office even closed a couple hours early yesterday. Back to normal today.
Why is a full moon important?