BLOG: Warm Stretch Continues
There will be a couple of quiet days ahead and we should enjoy them while they last since it is still February and the potential for problem weather is still high. Some of those problems may show up later in the weekend and/or early next week.
There will be some high clouds filtering the sunshine today, but with southwesterly flow at the surface as well as aloft we'll get a direct transport of milder air from the southern and central Plains where high temperatures were in the 60s, 70s and low 80s Wednesday. We'll push into the 60s today. Then we'll slide easily into the 70s tomorrow, coming close to the record, but probably falling just short.
The cold front moves through late Friday afternoon or early Friday evening and we may see a shower out of it, but largely dry weather is expected with its passing. So we'll see a 20-degree tumble (give or take) across the region on Saturday afternoon.
On Sunday, a wave of energy aloft and associated low pressure moving in from the west will cause more clouds to move over the eastern U.S. The GFS is putting rain here in the morning, but the bulk of the rainfall would pass to our north. The EURO is showing something similar, but even drier during the day. It's suggesting some light rain could reach the area by day's end, though I suspect it holds off until nighttime as previously thought. The latest Canadian is slower with the arrival at Sunday night with some snow falling in the higher elevations to the northwest.
It now appears that this first wave will move off and we'll have a dry Monday overall with any precipitation holding along the front over Virginia. This could reach us later in the day as the second wave of energy moves eastward. It now appears that the best shot for anything will be Monday night into Tuesday morning and with that, snow will be the most likely scenario given the temperature profiles. At current pace this would move off early Tuesday. The EURO keeps the second wave well to the south which would account for colder and drier weather Tuesday.
