Early on the morning on December 5th, a Nor’easter, dubbed by the Weather Channel as “Winter Storm Eartha”, left hundreds of thousands of civilians across the northeast without power, according to theweatherchannel.com. This storm relatively early in the season dumped over 4 inches of snow in Concord and over a foot in Paxton, Massachusetts, as recorded by boston.com; wind gusts up to forty miles per hour were not uncommon during the storm. Max Merhige, a Sudbury resident, regarded his experience with the storm as eerie, “I remember my family and I were staying inside, and every couple of minutes we would point out the wind. It was loud—like deafening. […] The power went out, and I have a distinct memory of [feeling] genuinely worried.”
Though nor’easters are familiar to many New Englanders, coming usually once every winter, their effects can still have a massive impact on daily life, usually dumping snow and causing coastal erosion, as well as producing high winds from the northeast between their most active times of forming between October and April. According to CNN, these storms are a type of macro-scale extratropical cyclone. The storms, if strong enough, can cause coastal erosion, flooding, and power outages.
Though Concord escaped Eartha’s full intensity, another nor’easter, Flynn, is slated to come to the state between December 16th to 17th and has the possibility of dropping over a foot of snow in our area. Merhige shared, “This time, it feels more real: Eartha felt like a test run, but Flynn feels like the real deal.” Though the future of the winter season remains uncertain, it is vital to keep our heads up. According to Merhige, “if there’s any year for a bad winter season, 2020 and 2021 would […] almost [be] on-brand for bad news to happen!”