Major storm poised to unload snow on U.S. East Coast

Satellite image of the eastern United States taken at 7:15 p.m. EST Saturday.

Travelers warned to stay home

In this story: Run on shovels, blowers 'It's very rare' RELATED STORIES, SITES

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- U.S. East Coast residents with travel plans for Monday are being warned of a powerful storm moving into the region that has the potential to be the worst so-called "nor'easter" in 50 years.

The storm may hit as early as Sunday night and is likely to create blizzard conditions, according to CNN Meteorologist Chad Myers. The storm has the potential to drop at least 3 feet of snow from Virginia to western New England, with most of those areas expected to pick up at least a foot of snow, he added.

The National Weather Service said there is a significant potential for coastal flooding due to high winds from the mid-Atlantic into the Northeast.

Myers said the winds may blow up to 70 miles an hour, causing exceptionally high tides and blowing ocean water inland. Boaters along the East Coast were urged to take precautions.

RESOURCES Find out how it can be 38 degrees and snowing, prepare your home and car for the cold and know how winter can affect your health, in CNN.com's Winter Weather In-Depth Special    STORM WARNINGS National Weather Service winter storm warnings    CNN WEBCAM Live images of Times Square, New York

A Northeastern storm is created when the warm air off the East Coast meets the cold air in the Northeast, creating a strong low-pressure system.

"Given the possibility of the heavy snow just north of Washington into New York City and western New England Sunday night and Monday, people who have travel plans ought to reconsider even now if they can," said Louis Uccellini from the National Centers for Environmental Prediction.

"This is going to be a major disruption to the East Coast by Monday morning," he said.

Winter storm watches were in effect from Virginia through the New England states, the National Weather Service said.

Run on shovels, blowers

Hardware store owner Art D'Armiento in North Brunswick, New Jersey, said he ran out of snow shovels Saturday morning and picked up another shipment around noon, but 15 minutes later he was sold out again.

"People were fighting over them," he said.

D'Armiento also said about 15 people brought in snow blowers for repairs Saturday. "They're panicked," he said.

Roxane Boutcher buys supplies Saturday in Warwick, Pennsylvania in advance of a predicted snowstorm

A Home Depot store at Manchester, Connecticut, fielded "quite a lot of calls" on Saturday for kerosene, snow blowers and salt, said assistant manager John Nisbet.

Connecticut has already had 11 snowstorms this season, with nearly 2 feet falling in early February.

"We pretty much are sold out of snow blowers," Nisbet said. "We don't have a large supply of shovels. By now, they've either got one or they don't need one. Salt we still have."

The New York State Emergency Management Office was on alert and other state agencies had been notified, said emergency management spokesman Dennis Michalski.

"Everyone is standing by to see which direction it goes," said Dean Pagani, spokesman for Connecticut Gov. John G. Rowland.

'It's very rare'

Major cities including Washington, Baltimore, New York and Boston, were "under the gun for the potential for heavy snow," said Michael Eckert, a senior meteorologist with the National Weather Service.

Eckert called the late-winter storm highly unusual in that it represented the combination of two mighty weather systems.

"It's very rare. We just don't see things like this happen very often," he said.

Eckert said "a very, very deep cold-air dome" had moved down through eastern Canada and the northeastern part of the United States and toward the Great Lakes and the Ohio Valley.

Another storm system was moving up the East Coast Saturday night from its position over the Southeast.

"What's going to happen is they'll eventually merge into one main system," he said. "You combine the extreme wetness of the system coming up from the South with the really deep, cold air of the North, and you've got the ingredients there for a major storm."

The rain could begin to turn into snow toward Sunday evening near Washington -- and perhaps as far south as Richmond, Virginia, Eckert said. The storm is then expected to move slowly northeast up into southern New England through Monday and into Tuesday, dumping heavy snow all the way to Portland, Maine, he added.

"This one has similarities to the storm in late January of 1966," Eckert said. "That one produced blizzard conditions over New England and New York, and there also was quite a bit of heavy snow down into the Washington area."

That storm blanketed a large area with 2-3 feet of snow, with some locations east of Lake Ontario receiving 6 feet of snow.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

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Northeast storm dumps up to a foot of snow
January 21, 2001

National Weather Service
NYS Emergency Management
National Snow and Ice Data Center
Climate Prediction Center, Expert Assessments

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