National Weather Service forecasters say the precipitation will continue into the evening, though it will be lighter than we saw earlier today. But warmer air is working it's way into the region, and that means we'll see more rain south and east of the cities, but sleet and freezing rain north and west.

Here, I'll just let the folks in Sterling sort it out:

"AS FOR P-TYPE (PRECIPITATION TYPE), WARMER AIR IS WORKING INTO THE REGION ALOFT ALLOWING
FOR SNOW TO MIX WITH SLEET...FREEZING RAIN...AND EVEN RAIN
THIS AFTERNOON. FROM THE CITIES SOUTH AND EAST THERE WILL BE JUST
ENOUGH WARM AIR OFF THE OCEAN FOR TEMPERATURES TO BE ABOVE FREEZING
CAUSING THE MAIN P-TYPE TO BE RAIN/DRIZZLE. FURTHER NORTH AND WEST
ACROSS THE SUBURBS AND FOR ALL LOCATIONS ALONG AND WEST OF THE BLUE
RIDGE...LOW-LEVEL COLD AIR WILL LIKELY HOLD IN PLACE AND WITH
TEMPERATURES WARMING ALOFT THIS MEANS THE MAIN P-TYPE WILL BE SLEET
AND FREEZING RAIN/DRIZZLE. GIVEN THE FACT THAT THERE WILL BE A
THREAT FOR FROZEN PRECIP THROUGH THIS EVENING INTO THE
OVERNIGHT...WE WILL KEEP THE WARNINGS AND ADVISORIES POSTED FOR NOW"

Bottom line, stay home with a good book tonight.

So far Glen Burnie, of all places, seems to hold the brass ring for the most snow in the Baltimore area today, at least according to the latest storm report from Sterling.

And the cleanup has begun. Our ace tech person in the newsroom has just put on his coat and he's headed up to the roof to sweep off the satellite dish antennas. The snow cut off reception of our Associated Press news and features feeds, and our New York Times wire feed. 

And here's a hoot. I received this photo this afternoon from Steve Zubrick, the NWS science and operations officer out at Sterling.

Here's what he had to say about it:

"Frank,

Check this out...this is >one< "snowflake" that landed on my shirt around 3 PM this afternoon here at the weather office that measured nearly 1.75" across. Wow! This is an aggragate of snow flakes. When the whole sky is full of these, it's impressive!

Winds were very light at the time. These mega-flakes fell almost vertically. If winds were gusty, these mega-flakes would never make it to the surface.

Picture credit: NWS WFO forecaster Steve Rogowski (and that's my shirt!).

Steve Z."