With snow burst in Boston, storm breaks record

Nor’easter leads to outages, flooding

A pumpkin in Pembroke was capped in snow Sunday morning.John Tlumacki/Globe Staff

The storm that brought Massachusetts its first snow of the season, along with strong winds, power outages, and coastal flooding, was a record-breaker.

The nor’easter hit the state Saturday and churned into Sunday, depositing the most snow recorded on any Nov. 2 in 120 years, according to weather observers.

“It’s cold, it’s blustery,” said Benjamin Sipprell, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. “Winter is here.”

By midmorning, Greater Boston was seeing snow, which continued into the early afternoon before turning back into rain and sleet and then clearing out.

But in Southeastern Massachusetts, snow fell steadily most of the day — in Hyannis and Falmouth until about 5 p.m., when the flakes turned into raindrops, according to Sipprell.

The area just inside Interstate 495 and toward Rhode Island had mixed snow and rain, which had stopped by 6 p.m., Sipprell said.

Snow accumulated in some areas, with 1.7 inches reported on Big Blue Hill in Milton, 0.8 inches in Freetown, and 0.5 inches in Wakefield. By mid-afternoon, it had all largely stopped.

Patriots fans watched their team play in the cold with temperatures that dropped into the 20s by 6 p.m. Snow had to be cleared from the field before the game started at 4:25 p.m. “They got their first touch of winter tonight,” Sipprell said.

Trees fallen on roads, power lines, cars, and houses were reported in many areas.

NStar reported 3,500 customers without power at 6 p.m., most of them in the Cape Cod, Boston, and Cambridge areas.

National Grid had about 4,000 customers without power, according to spokesman Jake Navarro. As intense winds continued into the evening, downed trees were cutting power in some areas on the North Shore, according to Navarro.

“We have crews out there working on it,” he said.

As of 10 p.m., about 1,000 customers of NStar and National Grid still lacked power.

The coastal regions had minor flooding, but “it wasn’t an astronomical high tide,” said Bill Simpson, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, earlier in the day.

Because of the wind speed and direction, the surf rose to 9 feet, “which is pretty significant,” Simpson said.

Flooding closed some roads in Plymouth County and on Nantucket, according to National Weather Service reports.

The Steamship Authority suspended ferry service to Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket due to the high winds and rough seas.

After 6 p.m., high-wind warnings for Barnstable, Dukes, and Nantucket counties were reduced to a wind advisory, though winds up to 50 miles per hour were expected through the evening, Sipprell said.

Temperatures were dropping Sunday night and were expected be in the upper 20s by early Monday morning.

The first part of this week will bring a reprieve, though.

Monday is expected to be mostly sunny, with highs only in the mid-30s.

Temperatures should rise to the low to mid-50s on Tuesday, before rising into the high 50s for a cloudy Wednesday.

Stormy weather could make a comeback Thursday into Friday, however, according to forecasters.