CARIBOU, Maine — After yet another winter storm on Friday, the weather was on its way to becoming drier and sunnier, weather forecasters said Friday night.
Hancock and Washington counties were under a winter weather advisory for much of the early part of the day, according to the National Weather Service’s Caribou forecast center.
By Friday night, however, the advisory had been lifted, meteorologist Mark Bloomer said.
As of 8 p.m., all that remained were some flurries in eastern Aroostook and northern Washington counties, Bloomer said. As expected, Down East Maine got the most snow, with some spots seeing accumulations of roughly half a foot.
Those areas included Machias and Marshfield, which received 6 inches of snow, and Bar Harbor, which saw 5.3 inches.
There was less snowfall inland, with Ellsworth seeing 3 inches. Penobscot County saw relatively little snow, with the Bangor area receiving a dusting and Lee seeing a snowfall total of 2.5 inches, he said.
High winds on the coast resulting in about 1,000 power outages in the two counties that were under the advisory.
“That always happens when there’s high winds Down East,” the meteorologist said.
The weekend weather outlook called for a partly sunny Saturday and a mostly sunny Sunday, Bloomer said.
“In other words, pretty dry,” he said.
That will be an improvement over the start of Friday, when the combination of high winds and blowing snow limited visibility and made driving conditions difficult.
The conditions prompted the Maine Turnpike Authority to reduce the speed limit to 45 mph from Augusta to Kittery.
The Maine Turnpike Authority also reported that a multivehicle crash at mile 56 in Falmouth blocked the travel lane on the northbound side.
Department of Public Safety spokesman Stephen McCausland said Interstate 295’s northbound lanes in Yarmouth were closed for awhile Friday morning because of a large number of slide-offs.
The road reopened to traffic around 9:45 a.m. The slide-offs were caused by motorists traveling too fast for road conditions.
McCausland reported later Friday among the dozens of crashes that occurred on the turnpike was a collision between a pickup and a tanker truck in Arundel.
Both vehicles wound up off the southbound side of the highway as the pickup was attempting to pass the big rig, according to McCausland.
The pickup’s driver, Scott Stone, 48, of Massachusetts, and the rig’s driver, Glenn Martin, 57, of Buckfield, suffered minor injuries, McCausland said.
There was minor leakage from the tractor-trailer’s fuel tank but not from the tanker portion.
Bangor Daily News writer Ryan McLaughlin contributed to this report.