A white Christmas unlikely for Long Island after light morning snowfall

Parts of Long Island were frosted for a white Christmas Eve as a coating of snow fell Tuesday morning, the National Weather Service said.

The flakes moved through New York City and Long Island around 7 a.m., gradually decreasing as the snow traveled east.

While Central Park received an inch of snow and Glen Cove saw slightly less, the National Weather Service recorded only one-tenth of an inch in Islip.

“It tapered as it went east, as expected,” said meteorologist Dominic Ramunni with the NWS Upton office.

Temperatures will hover in the 30s on what should be a sunny Christmas Day and drop to the low 20s for the first night of Hanukkah, the weather service predicts.

What little snow did not melt Tuesday afternoon may stick around on lawns tomorrow morning to “set the mood for Christmastime,” Ramunni said, but will likely melt Wednesday afternoon or later this week.

High temperatures will climb to around 40 degrees Friday and breach 50 come Monday, the weather service forecasts.

There are “a couple different rounds of rain possible” Sunday into Monday, and Tuesday into the middle of next week, Ramunni said.

“Perhaps,” he added, Long Islanders will ring in “a soggy New Year as opposed to a white one.”