Warmer weather forecast for New Year's

Revelers watching the ball drop Friday night in Times Square are likely to have their winter parkas unzipped and their feet in puddles of slush, according to the National Weather Service's forecast.

After the blizzard that began the week, daytime temperatures Thursday and Friday are expected to rise into the low 40s before peaking at an almost-balmy 47 degrees on New Year's Day.

Thursday night, the mountains of snow beginning to melt may refreeze when the mercury dips to about 26 degrees. But on New Year's Eve, temperatures are expected to hold at an above-freezing 37 degrees at midnight, making for a drippy beginning to 2011.

"It's going to start to melt out there," said Lauren Nash, a meteorologist at the weather service's Upton office, noting that New Year's Day is expected to be one of the top 10 warmest since 1984, though it is not expected to break into the top five.

And for Long Islanders who may still see white covering their front walks and driveways on Saturday, take heart. A warm rain is forecast to move in Saturday night and continue through Sunday - when the high is expected to hit about 45 degrees - helping to clear away any snow still hanging on, Nash said.

Feel like you've already been through the winter-weather wringer and it's not even January? So far, this has been one of the coldest Decembers since the weather service began tracking temperatures at Upton in 1984, Nash said.

The average temperature this month so far is 31.6 degrees. That is colder than any December in a quarter-century except 1989, when the average temperature was 24.8, and 2000, when the average temp was 29.6, she said.

SEE PHOTOSSnowstorms that buried LI over the past 100-plus years

Where snowfall is concerned, according to the weather service's records, this month's 14.9 inches of snow tops all but December 2009, when a snowstorm on Dec. 19 and 20 dumped about 25 inches on the Island, Nash said.