Remnants of Gulf Coast snowstorm impacting Europe as powerful bomb cyclone
Forecasters in the United Kingdom have named the system Éowyn. Both the UK and Ireland are bracing for powerful winds that could down trees and cause widespread power outages.
Europe on alert for powerful bomb cyclone
Weather alerts have been issued by local national weather services for Ireland and the United Kingdom as a powerful storm system works across the Northern Atlantic into western Europe. Forecasters expected peak wind gusts to reach 80-100 mph on Friday and into the early weekend.
DUBLIN, Ireland – Energy from a storm system that produced record snowfall along the Gulf Coast is expected to bash Western Europe with heavy precipitation and damaging wind gusts late in the workweek and into the early weekend.
Forecasters have named the storm system Éowyn as it rapidly strengthened in the Northern Atlantic and became what is known as a bomb cyclone.
Linda Hughes, from Met Éireann, Ireland's meteorological agency, spoke to FOX Weather about the storm system, describing it as one of the strongest in recent memory.
"It’s certainly going to be a very unusual event," Hughes stated. "This storm has been gathering energy over the Atlantic, and with a strong jet stream guiding it toward us, we're expecting extremely strong winds to start impacting Ireland from midnight tonight."
A "bomb cyclone" is an area of low pressure that has seen a drop of 24 millibars of air pressure during a period of 24 hours or less. It commonly happens in hurricanes.
While the western part of the European continent is no stranger to intense storm systems, hurricane-force wind gusts were expected to down trees and cause widespread power outages.
"The models have been doing pretty good this week with forecasting this storm," Hughes said. "So thankfully, we've had a few days to prepare the public for what's coming."
TORNADOES RIP ACROSS GERMANY INJURING DOZENS
Satellite picture of Storm Éowyn
(EUMETSAT / FOX Weather)
The storm system, aided by a powerful jet stream, over-preformed along the U.S. Gulf Coast, with record amounts of ice and snow along the Interstate 10 corridor.
New Orleans saw its snowiest day in more than 100 years with 8 inches of frozen precipitation at the Big Easy’s international airport and nearby Mobile, Alabama, smashed its 130-year-old snow record.
Climatologists are still combing through observations in Florida, but the state easily surpassed its all-time greatest snowfall event. That was on March 6, 1954, when just 4 inches fell outside of Pensacola. During the most recent event, Pensacola officially reported 8.9 inches with totals nearing double digits in nearby communities.
Following the ice and snow, a record chill overtook the region with real-feel temperatures dropping into the single digits as far south as the Gulf Coast.
Snowfall accumulation map from 1/21/2025
(NOAA)
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Across Western Europe, a temporary reprieve from the hazardous weather is expected late Saturday into Sunday. However, forecasters are already tracking another significant area of low pressure that is expected to impact some of the same areas late into the weekend and into next week.
"A further area of low pressure will influence the UK’s weather from Sunday, initially in the west, but spreading further east and bringing further wind and rain from Sunday and into the start of next week, with further warnings issued," the UK’s national weather service stated.