NEW YORK - Mayor Bill deBlasio said Sunday that a major winter storm could among the worst the city has ever seen.
"We are facing most likely one of the largest snow storms in the history of this city," said DeBlasio at a press conference. "Don't underestimate this storm."
The National Weather Service has a blizzard warning in effect for the New York and Boston areas starting Monday night. Forecasters say a massive storm could drop two to three feet of snow from northern New Jersey to southern Connecticut.
Boston is expected to get 18 to 24 inches of snow, and Philadelphia could see 14 to 18 inches.
"This will be the strongest storm of the year," National Weather Service meteorologist Brian Hurley told CBS New York. "This Nor'easter is going to produce a wide swath of snowfall."
At a news conference Sunday DeBlasio held up a list of the city's top 10 snowstorms and said this one could land at the top of a list that goes back to 1872.
"All New Yorkers should stay off the road tomorrow." - Mayor @BilldeBlasio. Watch live on
http://t.co/10woiev32p.— NYC Mayor's Office (@NYCMayorsOffice) January 25, 2015
The storm, with blizzard-like conditions could drop a foot or more of snow across most parts of the Northeast as they gear up for the workweek right after the first real storm of the winter hit them with rain, several inches of snow and messy slush.
A storm system diving out of the Midwest has the potential to slowly coat from Philadelphia up to Massachusetts and Maine with snow beginning late Sunday night into Monday and intensifying greatly well into Tuesday, the National Weather Service said.
"There's the potential for a significant snowstorm to impact the entire Northeast U.S.," meteorologist Patrick Maloit said.
CBS New York reports some isolated areas on Long Island could see up to 2 feet of snow.
Tri-State area residents could expect to see light snowfall Monday morning. It will intensify throughout the day, with 1 to 3 inches having fallen by dusk.
The brunt of the storm will then move in Monday night.
The storm, which brewed late Saturday around the Iowa-Minnesota line, is likely to track down into the central Appalachians and then very slowly traverse its way through the Northeast states and reach the Gulf of Maine late Tuesday night, he said. The slow movement of the storm, he said, could help produce quite a bit of snowfall and blizzard-like or blizzard conditions: at least three hours of wind gusts of 35 mph or greater and visibility of less than a quarter of a mile because of snow or blowing snow.
