Welcome to the weather blog - a regular Monday through Friday
discussion of the weather! While the discussions usually will only
come on days I'm working, I'll issue special updates when the weather
warrants. I will always post to let you know when no discussion is
expected if I'm away on vacation, etc. - if no update is here and no
info is available, that likely means the server has temporarily gone on
the fritz and I will update as soon as technically possible. You'll
find a quick weather synopsis linked to the daily forecast at the top
of the page, a general non-technical weather summary below, and when
available (most days) a detailed technical meteorological discussion
will follow by mid-afternoon. My email is contact@mattnoyes.net. This blog is for you, so I hope you enjoy it! -Matt Noyes
General Weather Summary:
Happy Summer! Today is, of course, the summer solstice and therefore the official start of summer on the calendar. In the world of meteorology, we consider June 1 to be the start of meteorological summer, running until meteorological fall begins on September 1. Nonetheless, the summer solstice marks that time when the sun finds its highest angle in the Northern Hemisphere sky, and summer officially begins at 2:06 PM. Believe it or not, this isn't actually the longest day, however, as we'll find our day a few seconds longer on Friday - suffice to say, the next four days are the longest of the year!
Of course, the next step is to get the weather to cooperate for New Englanders to enjoy the ample daylight, and I think we're in good shape heading into the weekend. The pattern will feature an active jet stream wind screaming across the Northern Tier of the United States, sending energetic disturbances sailing over New England nearly every 24 hours. The first of those disturbances moves in Thursday afternoon.
One noticeable difference from Wednesday morning to Thursday morning is the change in airmass for New England - from muggy to comfy, regionwide. With a new, cooler, drier airmass, one would think our chance of showers and thunderstorms would be quite low, but surface moisture is only one component of shower development, and the remaining components will more than outweigh our lack of humidity Thursday afternoon. One of these components is a strong upper level disturbance evident on both satellite and radar imagery over Lake Ontario Thursday morning. This energetic system, carried by the fast jet stream winds aloft, will race through New England Thursday afternoon, carrying a pool of cold air aloft and at the surface. Though the leading edge of the surface cold air is defined by a cold front and will sweep through New England overnight Thursday night, leaving behind cooler air for Friday, the cold air aloft has already spread east and will move over New England through the day Thursday. The difference in temperature between warmth at the surface, where temperatures rise to around 80, and the cold air aloft will create a favorable setup for deep cloud growth, resulting in showers and thunderstorms. Early this morning I already have seen elements of a line of downpours coming together over Lake Ontario, and one informal guideline for meteorologists is to expect organized strong thunderstorms later in the day if you already see signs of organization early in the day. Timing on these showers and storms would be around 2 or 3 PM in Vermont, 3 or 4 PM in Western Massachusetts, and closer to 5 or 6 PM in Southeast New Hampshire and perhaps Eastern Massachusetts. Though coverage will be scattered and not all communities will be hit by showers and thunder, storms that do develop will tap strong winds just a few thousand feet off the ground this afternoon to create locally damaging wind bursts, capable of downing trees and power lines in harder hit communities. Of course, you can follow the progression of storms with radar links at right, and check for watches, warnings and advisories through either the Active Warnings link at left, or by entering your zip code into the WeatherBug utility (NO software is downloaded onto your computer through that utility - it is all web-based).
Though showers will continue until the upper level disturbance has passed - perhaps around sundown - skies will gradually clear behind this disturbance and temperatures will cool as the aforementioned cold front settles south. This will set up a rather crisp but sunny start Friday, with the only exception expected in the Green Mountains were some low altitude clouds may begin the day as a result of the chilly air spilling in aloft, but these clouds should break by mid-morning. New England's blend of sun and clouds to end the workweek will be interrupted later Friday afternoon by another moderately strong disturbance coming out of Canada that will take aim mostly on the northern half of the region, allowing clouds to billow high enough for scattered rain showers and maybe a thunderstorm or two with hailstones north of the Massachusetts state line later Friday. These storms will again be scattered, and only a limited number of communities are expected to see them before another cool and quiet night settles in for Friday night.
Saturday's disturbance aloft will have less moisture to work with in the New England sky, and therefore I'm not expecting many showers at all, except, perhaps in some of the far Northern reaches of New England. Those of you who read regularly will remember that earlier in the week I thought Saturday looked like a good candidate for possible thunder, but I also tried to make it clear that timing would be everything, and in this case, the timing of fast moving disturbances and available moisture seems to have changed a bit. That's one of the reasons that I love this blog - I have the opportunity to convey uncertainty and express honestly how I think things will evolve, while still acknowledging exactly what I'm looking at that gives me pause in a forecast. By Sunday, temperatures will be on the rebound but showers and thunderstorms are possible later in the day, in scattered form, as a front drops south on New England.
Though temperatures will
fluctuate a bit in the coming several days, the average pattern will
favor swings in temperature, but near normal temperatures in the next 5 days, then above normal temperatures overall that
will last through the end of next week. With the opening of a
southerly flow in the atmosphere, this will also set up a tap
from the Gulf of Mexico that may not bring heavy rain into New England,
but very well may put a significant dent in the severe and exceptional
drought that continues across the Tennessee River Valley and most of
the Southeastern U.S. next week. Closer to home, Monday's temperatures remain slightly uncertain, as there will be a building contrast between deep summer heat expanding northeast, and a bubble of cool high pressure settling southeast out of Quebec that will attempt to push cooler air southward into New England. At this point, I've gone for a gradual warming on Monday, but I really do believe that once the summer warmth arrives - making its way in on Tuesday and well-established by Wednesday - temperatures will soar.
All the while, the pattern will become
increasingly favorable by the first week of July for the Gulf Coast of
the United States to pay close attention to the tropics, as a large
high pressure center east of the Bahamas would favor steering any
storms that develop into the Gulf of Mexico.
Enjoy your day.
Matt
