Cape Cod Pasted with Heavy, Wet Snow; Scattered Outages Reported

BARNSTABLE – Cape Cod was under a winter weather advisory until early Friday evening as falling temperatures brought snowfall to much of Massachusetts.

Forecasters predicted 2-5 inches for the Upper Cape and closer to the canal, 1-4 for the Mid Cape, with lesser amounts on the Lower and Outer Cape. Areas off Cape in Southern Plymouth and Bristol counties saw 4-7 inches of snow.

The transition from rain to snow took longer on Cape Cod, which kept snowfall totals down locally.

National Weather Meteorologist Bill Simpson in Taunton said Cape Cod could experience winds gusts over 40 mph into the early evening, blowing around the snow.

“The evening commute might be okay, hopefully the road surfaces will have been treated by that time,” Simpson said.

The morning commute on Cape Cod was mostly uneventful, but driving became a little more treacherous by 10 a.m., with accidents reported on Route 6 and a head-on crash on Willow Street in Yarmouth in which a Cape Cod Regional Transit Authority bus caught on fire.

CCRTA Administrator Tom Cahir said the initial report from the scene indicated that a pickup truck may have slid into the path of the bus. The driver and one passenger were the only people on board. The passenger was taken to Cape Cod Hospital as a precaution.

Yarmouth Police charged Tracey Louise Smith, 28, of Wellfleet, with speeding, operating to endanger and failing to stay within marked lanes. The driver of the bus, Stephen Hull, 54, of South Dennis, was not charged.

Several Cape Cod school districts dismissed early Friday as the rain changed over to snow.

Gov. Charlie Baker urged residents to use caution if they were heading out during the day.

“The commute today home will be an especially messy one. We have 110 extra State Troopers patrolling the roads,” Baker said.

On the roads, MassDot said they had nearly 900 pieces of equipment at work across District 5, which includes Cape Cod and Southeastern Massachusetts.

“Mass Highway Department has about 3,200 pieces of equipment out there. They spent a good part of the night and early part of the morning de-icing the roads,” Baker said.

According to the Eversource outage map, there were scattered power outages across Cape Cod by mid-afternoon Friday.