Tens of millions of Americans from Washington to Boston and the Ohio Valley could be walloped by an end-of-the-week snowstorm, meteorologists say.
Although it’s still early, computer forecast models all see a windy, strong slow-moving storm. The big questions are where and how much.
“There’s going to be a big storm. Somebody’s going to get walloped,” said Victor Gensini, a meteorology professor at College of DuPage outside of Chicago, which should be spared. “It does look like it’s going to be a doozy.”
Rich Otto, lead forecaster at the National Weather Service’s Weather Prediction Center outside of Washington, said some major cities will likely see a foot or more of snow. Other meteorologists talked about 18 inches, two feet and more.
Gensini said the heavy snow is likely because the system will be slow moving. Forecasters see Saturday as the worst day in the East.
Early Tuesday, the Weather Prediction Center said the storm could be historic, but Otto said that may have been going a bit too far.
“Things will change; that’s a guarantee,” Otto said. “Nothing ever stays the same with these forecasts.”
Storms like this can impact the economy in many ways, ranging from short-term disruption to major financial damage, it can also servery hit logistics and supply chain operations.
This East Coast storm region is estimated to produce approximately $16 billion in daily economic output.
How Bad Weather Can Take Supply Chains by Storm - and How You Can Prepare
Bad weather is brutal for shippers, developing a proactive plan to deal with it is the best way to prepare yourself for whatever happens.
Trucks get stuck on congested, unplowed highways. Railroads can’t clear snow from the tracks fast enough for trains to get through. Snow and ice made it impossible for planes to safely land and take off. Like dominoes, one delay leads to another, disrupting supply chains across the country.
Many managers had developed lean budgets around negotiated rates. But those rates went out the window as service failures occurred. Rather than explore mode shifting to deal with the sudden capacity shortage, shippers rushed to the spot market to snap up capacity. Rates went way up.
Faster than some people expected, upper management came to call. They wanted to talk about why the transportation budget was so out of whack, but many transportation professionals were unprepared to explain it.
Like death and taxes, bad weather will occur sometime this year. Rather than leave things to chance, you can use these 8 tips to help you develop a plan to deal with the most common issues that arise with capacity and rates.
Perhaps the most important survival recommendation is to prepare to talk to upper management about the transportation budget. You can get some ideas for these conversations by downloading the White Paper “Add Resilience to Supply Chains”