MATTNOYES.NET - Weather Website & Blog

Is Kyle a dud? Why I'm not too excited about him, even for Cape Cod or Eastern Maine

Well, here's the honest analysis:  Kyle has strengthened.  He's a hurricane and his thunderstorms near the center look better than ever, with infrared satellite imagery showing the coldest cloud tops of his lifetime.  There are signs of these thunderstorms wrapping around the northwestern periphery of the storm, and Tropical Storm Warnings (for sustained winds of 39 mph or greater) are up for Eastern Maine, as well as a Hurricane Watch (the possibility, though not imminent, of 74 mph winds or greater), with a Tropical Storm Watch up all the way south through Portland to Cape Elizabeth, on the Southern Maine coastline.  It's absolutely essential that folks prepare as directed by the National Weather Service.  I'll write it again - it's absolutely essential that folks in the warned area prepare for tropical storm force winds by securing vessels on the dock, taking in lightweight objects, and being prepared for some power outages.  Having said that, this meteorologist has serious doubts that we will get a single tropical storm force (39 mph or greater) gust in New England as Kyle passes by.  Here's why:

• Kyle has yet to develop convection (thunderstorms) on his west side.  This is usually necessary to bring strong winds down to the surface.
• There have been indications that the strengthening thunderstorm mass has been attempting to wrap around the north side of the circulation, but the storm's acceleration to the northeast keeps inhibiting this from happening
• Kyle is expected to continue accelerating northeast
• There is excellent agreement among the guidance that the storm will go just east of the National Hurricane Center track, passing just off the western coast of Nova Scotia (image is courtesy Jonathan Vigh, Colorado State Univ.  For more info, click here).
• Buoy and ship reports, as well as satellite estimated winds, on the west side of the storm show no sustained wind greater than 22 mph, though sustained winds to 45 mph are found due north of the circulation center
• The storm will soon move over waters cool enough to lead to weakening as a tropical system, meaning the storm will become "extratropical," or non-tropical
• In order to get symmetric winds - that is, strong winds on both the east and west side of the storm circulation - we either need to have a truly tropical cyclone (not going to happen over cool water and given the extratropical transition described above) or a quick and potent transition to a strong non-tropical cyclone that will spread wind away from the center.  Such a transition requires a strong, energetic disturbance in the jet stream to enhance the storm's transition
• We have no such strong disturbance aloft that will interact with Kyle
• This leaves us with a slowly decaying storm that will be undergoing a slow extratropical transition, given no upper level jet stream disturbance to hasten its transition
• There is nearly unanimous agreement among the intensity guidance (see image...same credit as the previous) that the result is a steadily weakening storm that is reduced to weak Tropical Storm or perhaps even Tropical Depression strength (sustained winds less than 39 mph) by the time it passes just west of Nova Scotia, and given the above factors I'd expect those winds to be on the east side of the storm

Put all of this together, and I'd be surprised to find ANY gusts (let alone sustained wind) to tropical storm force - 34 mph or greater - on land in New England.  The best chance may be at the buoy off the Downeast coast near Jonesport, at buoy #44027.

Is this wise to go against the National Hurricane Center's forecast?  Am I jeopardizing lives and property by saying this?  Well, keep in mind that I have the luxury of NOT being on the air this weekend - these are thoughts I can share with you between two weather-inclined folks.  The forecasters at the National Hurricane Center are among the best in the world - true experts in the field - and that's why all folks in the warned area MUST make preparations.  Having said that, New England tropical cyclones are among the trickiest in the world, and Kyle is no exception to the rule.  Sunday we'll find out what reality brings.

Do you think I'm nuts?  Do you agree?  Add your thoughts in the comments section!

Matt

The nature of banded rainfall - a headache for forecasters...and for everyone else!

I didn't have much of a meteorological offering here today, as the discussion linked from the weather summary link at the top of this page (the discussion that appears on the NECN blog) was a 10 minute video discussion, which pretty much covered all of my thoughts on the situation for this weekend.

One theme was banding of precipitation through the weekend - rainfall that comes and goes, but falls heavily when it comes down.  Of course, the intensity is a result of the tropically loading airmass with a persistent southeast wind and the deep tropical tap.  The banding comes as the composition of the atmosphere changes on a horizontal plane - that is, we began the evolution with cool and dry air in place.  Advecting (moving) a warm and moist airmass in from the tropics and off of the Atlantic resulted in a clash of airmasses over New England, and this clash resulted in a shield of rain that was solid and persistent.  With time, a series of frontal boundaries became laid out across New England at varying altitudes.  The surface front has been draped across Southern New England, while the front at 925 mb and 850 mb has lifted farther north, and this results in multiple areas of temperature differences from south to north, or more accurately, from southeast to northwest.

Though a northeast wind persists at the surface, north of the surface front, a southeast and southerly flow is taking hold a few thousand feet off of the ground.  Of course, with a tap to tropical moisture, these southerly winds are carrying increasingly warm and humid air into New England.  Not only is this warm and humid air naturally buoyant (remember, warm and moist air rises!), but as it encounters the frontal boundaries at various locations and altitudes across New England, that warm and moist air is forced upward, causing enhanced clouds and therefore enhanced bands of rainfall.  This phenomenon, coupled with repetitive surges of increased warmth and moisture, results in the banded nature of precipitation.

This can be a frustrating proposition for forecasters and for everyone else.  For forecasters, the frustration comes because our bread and butter is accurately telling folks where and when rain will fall, and for how long.  We simply can't do that accurately in a complex, varied and constantly evolving atmosphere like the one described here.  We occasionally see such a setup in a winter storm, resulting in heavier snow bands, but even in those situations, though it's tricky, it's a bit more maneuverable because cold air is heavy and dense, and therefore, everything moves slower.  With warm season airmasses, there's a great deal more liquidity to the airmass, which means the target to hit is moving much faster.

The result?  "Periods of rain, heavy at times."  As we get closer to the event, we can start to nail down the time and duration of breaks in the action, but even such "breaks" are more accurately lulls, as so much tropical moisture can easily breed convective showers and thunder even in between better defined bands.  Of course, this is equally frustrating for folks who rely on the forecasts!  In such circumstances, I'm often very honest with my viewers that trust in the forecast should be minimal outside of 24 hours, increased within that 24 hour window, further increased inside of 12 hours, and reliable within about 6-8 hours.  Though that's not often the case - that such short-term solutions are necessary - when a tropically loaded atmosphere with a number of frontal boundaries exists, the scenario becomes far more volatile.

Matt

Kyle is born...what happens next?

Kyle looks rather sad with his lopsided convection, but the thunderstorms east of the center are build well with cold cloud tops.  The shear north of the storm has been up to 50 knots - extremely strong shear that would tear any storm to pieces - but has been decreasing dramatically in the last few hours and should remain low to moderate in the next two days.  There is decent agreement among the hurricane guidance products on intensifying the storm to minimal hurricane strength at 48 hours (Saturday morning) with a Sunday AM passage over the Eastern Gulf of Maine.

There are some new questions that come to mind and must be answered in the next 12 to 18 hours.

1. Will the storm move as slowly as forecasted, or will it sling quickly north in the developing southerly flow?
2. Will this same southerly flow tear the top off the storm and effectively leave the surface circulation behind while the tropical moisture surges northward?
3. Will the warm front backing in from the ocean across New England, then stalling, serve as a boundary to focus more heavy rainfall than was initially expected, making it last longer through Saturday and into Sunday, or is the front too far removed from the storm to have this effect?
4. Will Kyle perform much like a poleward moving tropical cyclone and have a distinct separation of wind to the south and east of the track, and heaviest rain west, or will the combination of the frontal boundary and the increasing pressure gradient ahead of the high building over Southern Canada increase wind on the west side of the storm circulation?
5. How will the lack of convection on the west side play out in the life and longevity of the storm?
6. Will the rather ominous ECMWF (pictured below) verify?  It certainly is west of the hurricane track guidance, but is disconcerting to consider as a possible solution.

For me, I need some rest and will re-examine these questions in the morning (getting up at 2 AM will do that to a guy!).  But, if you have thoughts you'd like me to read when I sit down to analyze everything in the early AM, feel free to leave them in the comments section of this post!  In the meantime, check out tropical analysis and forecasting links on the Tropical Page of NationalWeatherOnline.com.

Matt

A shell game in the tropics...attention shifts to the Carolina coastline

With one much-talked about but lackluster tropical wave failing to produce, a creepy Carolina creature crawls coastward...

Click "continue reading" below to read the entire post.

A forecasting conundrum with the tropical wave

An intriguing scenario becomes even more intriguing, it seems.  It's one thing to be a week out, watching a tropical wave and seeing guidance forecasts for the disturbance to ramp up and head to New England.  It gets a bit stale when you're still doing the same thing on Tuesday, and the timeframe in question is Friday night or early Saturday.  I'm aware that I've been significantly downplaying this system contrasted with at least a few other media outlets - no mention of potential wind or rainfall amounts in my forecasts yet - but, let's look at this realistically...

When weather takes on a life of its own

It's begun.  Already.  The questions gaining momentum today are "Is it coming?" "When's it getting here?" and "What's going to happen with that hurricane down in the tropics?"

Keep in mind, that as of this writing we have neither a hurricane, nor a tropical storm, nor even a tropical depression.  In fact, thus far we have an open tropical wave with no official closed surface circulation (that may change when hurricane hunters report back)- in other words, a cluster of thunderstorms.  Granted, it's an impressive cluster that's dropped over 10 inches of rain in Puerto Rico.  And, granted, upper level winds have been becoming more favorable with outflow improving, allowing for sustained thunderstorms.  But there are issues with this, too.  Not only is it difficult to define any center of circulation (recon aircraft is investigating - there could be a small circulation with limited convection just east of the Dominican), but wind shear is rather significant in the middle and upper levels both north and south of the wave.  Additionally, steering currents in the middle and lower levels are still from east to west, not a northward flow.

All of these factors argue against any development.  In favor of development is the already good structure of the convection, warm ocean water, and a number of guidance products - including all hurricane guidance products - that spin the system up.  In the latest frames of the afternoon visible satellite loop, it becomes evident that a small circulation may be intact, over land, over the eastern tip of the Dominican.  This is also where, in the IR satellite image here, enhanced thunderstorm tops are showing up north of the main thunderstorm cluster.

Right now, there are far more uncertainties than certainties about whether this thing will ever even develop a closed circulation, let alone ramp up, and certainly not whether the storm will take one track or another if it does develop. 

But, alas, we as a society love something to watch and worry about.  Of course, there IS plenty that we could worry about with this storm - a forecast track into the Mid-Atlantic coast around Delmarva is one possibility that would be devastating for parts of Jersey, Delaware and MD.  A New England pass probably would go southeast of us but could bring a strong and damaging nor'easter.  But, before we get too carried away...we need a storm.  :)

Any thoughts on this, folks?  Comments are open on all the posts!

Sunday Night Prospectus, Week of September 21-27

Given that I work the Monday through Friday morning shift, it's usually sometime on Sunday that I sit down and look forward into the week.  The idea of this time isn't to nail down every detail of highs, lows, and exact timing/intensity of precipitation.  Rather, it's an opportunity for me to look forward at the big picture - a well-rested perspective, not bogged down in detail.  As the week wears on, I find myself getting bogged down in smaller forecast details, and this Sunday time of looking broadly into the future tends to keep me mindful of the big picture.

So, looking down the pike this week I see our Sunday evening line of storms waning, and drier air advecting in aloft - at both 500 and 700 mb - but 850 mb moisture lingers through the night.  With the surface front slowing if not stalling over Southern New England on Monday, this holds enough moisture for lots of morning clouds.  As the day wears on, the drier air aloft mixes down and eats away the low level deck, for increasing sun especially during the afternoon.

Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, ridging builds overhead.  Of course, it's as the center of the high moves east that the door may open to what appears likely to develop into Tropical Storm Kyle.  Having said that, there's a lot that needs to play out for Kyle to come to New England.  Certainly there are indications, especially in the Operational GFS, that Kyle may make a run to or very near New England.  This track would be a nearly worst-case track for New England, as it would come north up the Gulf Stream with no land impacts and warm water all the way.  That's not to say, though, that we're looking at a worst-case scenario, as the intensity guidance is in excellent agreement on a slow and rather linear strengthening to a category one hurricane by 120 hours.  What is not well agreed upon, however, is the aforementioned track.  While the Operational GFS may be taking the attention, the guidance is all over the place...as well they should be!  The most significant player is the cold front turned stationary that moves across the Southern Mid-Atlantic and drapes across the Atlantic, north of Kyle.  THIS front will be the big problem that is more certain - flooding rains for the Carolinas where 6-10" of rain is possible midweek.  At that point, there is vast disagreement on whether the storm stalls and waits for the southerly steering flow to take hold, coming into New England next weekend (historically unfavored - a stalled storm rarely gets to New England), or if it moves slowly enough to wait until the gate opens, then accelerates north (climatologically more plausible), or either splits or becomes baroclinic as it encounters the intense frontal boundary.  The latter seems like the most plausible solution, perhaps feeding flooding in the Southern Mid-Atlantic, with some low-level vorticity shearing east along the front as an open wave.

All of these possibilities hold potential, though at this point I favor the latter.  The GFS Ensemble members, for what it's worth, also favor this solution of a split with the low level center out to sea, and though the Canadian and Euro don't explicitly show this, there is evidence of a split here, too, though the ECMWF spins up a rather backwards secondary coastal low, west of the alleged Kyle, then spins it north up the coast.

Time will tell.  I invite your thoughts in the comments section of this post.

Matt

WITH HIGH PRESSURE IN CHARGE...A POLL OF MATTNOYES.NET USERS REGARDING THE FUTURE OF THIS SITE

Yawwwwn.  The weather recently has been rather dull, and the most excitement in sight is a cold front poised for Wednesday night that will bring a few rain showers to the far North Country - though maybe a few stray flakes to the mountains of Northwest Maine at about 3 or 4 AM!  But...literally a few stray flakes at most.  Then, it's another shot of yawwwwwwwwwnnnnn....dry weather and clear sailing through the weekend.  That's OK by me - a chance to relax a bit.

But it's also a time to think about this site and where you'd like it to go, and I want your opinions - all of them!  I hope you'll comment on this post, or send me an email in response, because your thoughts WILL determine where this site goes.

Background:  I established Mattnoyes.net in college, as a list of links because it was too hard to remember all of the URLs in my head.  After college, I took it down, and got so many emails from folks who were using the links, so up it went again.  A few years ago, it got a major overhaul when NECN didn't have the resources for our own site, and our partnered site, Boston.com, didn't want us putting any weather data on their weather page, because they wanted to keep it solely for the City of Boston, not suburbs or the rest of New England.  Thus, Mattnoyes.net was revamped and reborn.

The Page Now:  You can surf the pages for yourself - forecast, weather analysis, "Out and About" with school visits and community appearance videos, computer guidance links, the tremendously popular Sky Scenes gallery, a news page, and many more.  ALL of this came because you, the users, requested it.

The Current Situation:  NECN has come into the 90s, and is rocketing through the 2000s, thanks to a lot of hard work by folks at the station.  This has meant not only our own great website, but also, as of two weeks ago, our brand new weather blog.  Remember that Mattnoyes.net started because there was no other outlet - is wasn't for revenue or ego or anything else, just to get weather information out.  So, even though it's been years of work, and what amounts to solid weeks of web design, I'm completely understanding that NECN has asked to take most of what's on my site and merge it into theirs.  It's the right team thing to do - even though it could mean discarding years of hard work from this site, and the loss of some ad revenue, it will go to make my team stronger.

So...the question is...where would you like to see this site go?  Take a look at the New NECN Weather Blog.  See what you think.  Then let me know over the course of this quiet weather stretch what you'd like to see this site become.  You have always been the reason it's changed, and the reason it exists in the first place, so it only makes sense that you determine its future.  I will need to decide a new direction for it (or fold it up, if you so decide) very soon.

Some ideas in random order:

• I post brief weather ideas/questions/points to ponder in different situations, and we all respond via the comments to share forecast thoughts and analysis.
• I get rid of most of the site entirely.
• We merge almost all the pages into one homepage, since there will be fewer posts.
• We make it a blog about what it's like to be a meteorologist in specific situations - ie: thoughts about the forecast, concerns about the presentation of the information, worries about where we could blow the forecast, etc., with a video discussion, or something of that nature.
• Something else!  You tell me!

Whatever it is, it'll have to be something easy enough for one man to do on his own, and something that wouldn't make sense to have on the NECN Weather Blog, because I need to be sure it's clear my focus is with my team on that site, which is also where most of my energy is expected to be focused in the not-so-distant future.  Having said that, I can tell you that the Computer Guidance Page and Quick Forecast Page will stay for sure on Mattnoyes.net.

I invite you to share any and all of your thoughts in the comments section, even if they are "just can the whole thing, Noyes!" and, like I've done since day one, I will follow your direction.

All My Best - and enjoy the quiet weather!
Matt

CRISP FALL AIR TO LEAD TO NORTHERN FROST AND, FOR SOME, FREEZE

Yesterday's weather depended heavily upon location.  For some, the gusty pre-frontal winds and squall line both showed up, on cue, while for others, nothing but a band of rain arrived.  This was heavily dependent upon where warm air was able to get in - the farther north one was, the tougher it was to get the warm front through, and the farther west one was, the pre-frontal trough that ended up resulting in the squall line for central and eastern Southern New England brought rain to western areas early in the day, cooling the boundary layer and creating a shallow but stable cooler surface dome of air that was not penetrated before frontal passage during the afternoon/evening, which, for some, brought the most significant winds of the day.  For others, damage was done from the squall line.

Nonetheless, it's gone now.  Our attention turns to the very dry and cool airmass that's still advecting into New England on a northwest wind ahead of the anticyclone migrating east out of the Great Lakes.  This high will crest over New England late Wednesday night and early Thursday morning.  What this means is that the fair weather cumulus humilus and cumulus mediocris that are developing Wednesday afternoon will melt away as diurnal heating wanes, leaving clear skies.  The winds will quiet quickly with the approach of the high pressure center, and the atmosphere will decouple, leading to rapid temperature drops overnight.  Dewpoints are running in the 40s, but are still dropping in Northern New England and will be in the 30s overnight.  Temps will correspond to these dewpoint values, and frost is likely for most of VT, Northern NH and Central/Northern ME.  Hard freeze seems likely in the deeper valleys of the Greens, Whites and valleys of the Maine mountains.  There also will be a few patches of valley fog, and I suppose a touch of freezing fog is possible in the deepest valleys of Northern NH!

One thing we consider in circumstances like this is whether we need to worry about an isolated dust devil when the temperature warms in the morning.  The principle here is that very dry air expected to warm rapidly will create thermals rapidly early in the day, and the differential heating early in the day can enhance these thermals relative to their surroundings, creating pockets of increased buoyancy.  The high relative humidity where some fog is observed early makes these much less likely, but fog-free areas may warm quickly enough that an isolated dust devil can't be ruled out - though these are extremely difficult to predict in an operational setting.

As the anticyclone drifts east, the corresponding return flow will begin across New England, but only very lightly out of the west-southwest.  This will lead to some weak warm advection, and with the wind speed less than Wednesday, the feel on the body will be more than just a few degrees warmer Thursday afternoon.  Sunshine should be abundant with a deep dry column.

The upcoming weekend features a fast, mostly zonal flow across the Northern Tier of the country.  This means a series of fast-moving shortwaves embedded in the flow that will ride over New England Friday, Saturday and Sunday.  Friday's disturbance is late enough, and the moisture return slow enough, that showers are unlikely until evening or Friday night, as warm and moist advection increases, especially in the lowest 10K feet of the atmosphere.  This is likely to result in building, increasing Friday afternoon/evening clouds leading to the shower threat.  The NMM is developing a wave of low pressure with a solid inch of precipitation Friday night.  The GFS is far less pronounced.  The GGEM and many of its Ensemble members continue to favor a prolonged stretch of at times heavy rain this weekend, as moisture from the southern/central US and even some of Ike become entrained into the flow.  I have doubts on both the NMM solution of digging the northern stream shortwave, and with the solution of getting some of Ike involved, at least enough to make a difference for most of the weekend.  Therefore, I like the GFS solution best, which brings some showers through Friday night (lines up well with the warm advection), but keeps the shortwave a bit flatter.  Then, there does seem to be good agreement on the timing of the shortwaves among the guidance, even though the QPF forecasts are different.  So, in the end, I think we're looking at a few showers Fri eve/night, then again with the next shortwave Sat night into early Sunday morning, then maybe again Sunday night.  Of course, this timing is extremely optimistic for the weekend and the meteorologically inclined know that such fast and nearly zonal flow can change timing, but it seems like the best forecast right now, leaving an overall optimistic weekend.  More moisture seems to feed in with each shortwave, but that also seems likely to be cutoff for the middle of the week by a large anticyclone dropping into the midwest and ohio valley.  As that pulls out, the rest of Ike would be open to head up to the Northeast by the end of next week.

Now let's see what reality has planned!!

Matt

QUIET MONDAY TO GIVE WAY TO BUSY WIND, POTENTIAL SEVERE WEATHER TUESDAY

You like the video blog?  This is from the new NECN Weather Blog that launched Friday!  Joe, Tim and I will update it with more in-depth weather information than what we're able to convey in our brief TV weathercasts.  Check it out..and I hope you like it as it continues to grow and expand!

 

BTW - have you seen the piece where I got to fly with the U.S. Navy Blue Angels last week?  It was an AWESOME FLIGHT!!  If you've ever wondered what it's like to fly in a fighter aircraft (we went cloud surfing, too!) you HAVE to check out my post.  It's on the Meteorology Memos and More page, or you can link directly to the post.

Of course, you can continue to get down and dirty with weather info here, too, and with Hanna having come and gone, some may be wondering exactly what transpired with the storm.  The National Weather Service has a terrific list in the Public Info Statements and Storm Reports - a few of which are pasted in the extended body of this post (click "Continue Reading" at the bottom of this post to access it).  Impressive rainfall totals, but wind was lacking for most of New England - as anticipated, the greatest wind stayed southeast of the storm track.  As a result, this Tuesday is likely to be windier for most of New England than Hanna's passage was.

The players in the short term are a bubble of high pressure migrating quickly east from the Ohio Valley that will slide very quickly off our coastline and combine with the Northwest Atlantic ridge to bring building high pressure to the waters east of New England later Monday night into Tuesday.  At the same time, the pronounced cold front moving through the Great Lakes will receive an extra push from the shortwave aloft that's been producing Midwestern showers and thunder - the image here is of the 500 mb vorticity prognosis, illustrating the energy center driving across the Northeast on Tuesday afternoon.  The interaction of this upper level disturbance with the surface cold front will result in a developing wave of low pressure along the front that will strengthen Monday night into Tuesday while pulling across NY State and into Quebec.  After a quiet Monday, this establishes a pressure gradient force across New England that will yield only a light southwest wind in a weakly mixed atmosphere overnight Monday night (though the wind may limit fog development in Central and Southern New England), but will start cranking once the atmosphere mixes on Tuesday.  In fact, indications are that a low level jet between about 925 and 850 mb should crank from the south and southwest to the tune of 50-60 knots!  This is incredible velocity not far off the ground, and the sunshine that will make an appearance prior to the arrival of frontal and pre-frontal clouds will mix the atmosphere to about 850 or 870 mb, and that will be plenty to mix these winds down.  As a result, gusts to 45 or 50 mph have to be considered for Tuesday, especially at south facing coastlines and on hilly and mountainous terrain.  Additionally, favored downslope locales on a southwest wind hold the potential for some localized damaging gusts Tuesday afternoon, even with simply sun and building clouds, by virtue of the downward momentum transfer with mixing underway.  Any prefrontal convection that develops will, of course, easily tap these winds, and creating a line or multiple line segments of damaging thunderstorm winds should not be difficult.  The only retarding factor could be the amount of instability, though mean layer CAPE values are still forecasted to climb to between 500 and 1000 J/kg, which isn't great for a severe weather outbreak under normal circumstances, but the amount of dynamic forcing and kinematic profile of wind will not require much instability to produce damaging storms.  Additionally, the biggest limiting factor to instability normally is lack of sunshine - and while that will be at play with increasing moisture in the mid-levels ahead of the front, the advective properties of the strong southwest wind should be able to force the warm front far north, to near the Canadian border, thereby allowing warm air to penetrate across most of New England.

Following the front and its associated storms, a crisp airmass carves into New England for later Tuesday night and Wednesday, with Wednesday maximum temps likely to hover in the 60s central and north, and come either side of 70 south where a downsloping wind will help to warm the airmass.  Some instability cumulus are likely with the cool air streaming overhead, as 850 mb temps cool to +2 C!  Thursday will feature a recovery quickly aloft - with rising heights and a quick rebound at 850 mb, as well, but getting that warmer air in place at the surface may be a bit slower to evolve, so I kept a graduated moderation into the end of the week.  Another front looks primed for a few showers by late Friday, though multiple shortwave ejecting northeast ahead of a digging central US upper low may mean continued showers in the forecast into the start of the upcoming weekend.

Matt