It was a messy, snowy, icy night across New Jersey; as the precipitation ends today, we'll have to brace for the return of arctic cold air.

A slushy wintry mix in downtown Toms River
A slushy wintry mix in downtown Toms River (Dan Alexander, Townsquare Media NJ)
loading...

The highest overnight snow totals in New Jersey were centered around Gloucester, Camden, Burlington, Mercer, and Monmouth counties, all of which had at least one report of 6+ inches. With the exception of Cape May County, every other county in the state saw snow totals in the 3-4 inch range. As you may have seen last night, the snow changed over to wintry mix and rain for the southern two-thirds of the state, making for a snowy, icy, slushy, wet mess.

Current radar image from NJ101.5
Current radar image (green=rain, blue=snow/mix)
loading...

As of 7:30 a.m. Sunday morning, the precipitation has almost completely ended for Middlesex and Mercer counties and points north. The southern half of the state is still seeing some wintry mix (snow, sleet, and/or freezing rain) or just plain rain (mostly way south of the AC Expressway). Freezing rain will continue to be the worst of our concerns this morning, as just a little bit of ice can make surfaces incredibly slick.

The precipitation will continue to taper off through the rest of the morning. I expect the final raindrops to fall along the coast of South Jersey around 10 or 11 a.m.

Then, our attention will turn to the next weather event: yet another cold front that will deliver yet another blast of arctic air to New Jersey. Temperatures should begin to fall this afternoon. Even though highs will be in the lower 40s early this afternoon, we'll see overnight lows in the teens. Tomorrow's high temperatures will probably be back in the 20s - that's about 20 degrees below normal for this time of year. And yes, the wind chill will make it feel dramatically colder and more painful.

Of course, there's another potential problem with the plunging temperatures... a flash freeze. There are a lot of puddles and wet spots across the state, from the rain and today's expected snowmelt. As temperatures drop sharply overnight, they are expected to freeze. So yet another precarious, icy Monday morning commute is expected.

With eyes on the horizon, we'll be watching our next potential weather maker late Tuesday night into early Wednesday morning. It looks like a weak clipper system with just a brief shot of snow. But we'll have much more detail on this system online and on-air tomorrow morning.

More From New Jersey 101.5 FM