In the short term the weather pattern remains very benign. This post is going to mainly look at forecasts for the end of October and early November. While it's a ways out, I think it's the most interesting thing to look at in terms of the weather for our region as the short term will be dominated by warm and dry conditions. In the European Ensemble forecast above, valid November 2, the pattern is finally showing some signs of life. Notice dual troughs in the jet stream coming

FEELING MORE LIKE FALL A potent but fast moving disturbance raced across the region Thursday night and Friday replacing rain with gusty winds and much colder temperatures. The afternoon satellite image from Friday afternoon showed plenty of instability clouds and even some showers on the back side of the system. Temperatures Friday over much of the area were 12 to 22 degrees colder than 24 hours earlier. The drops were more substantial east of the Mississippi than west, due t

Like it or not, there comes a time each fall when the alarm awakens you to the fact that summer is done, put a fork in it! That's not to say we won't have some more very nice days ahead, but highs of 80 or above are likely done with until late March or April. Not only that, the wind driven chill that's descended on us tonight is just the tip of the iceberg of what our future holds the next 5 months. This little cold shot should come as no suprise though with Thanksgiving week

At least for a few days, we can kiss our recent run of balmy days goodbye. A complex storm system composed of a southern stream distrubance and a northern branch trough is in the process of phasing. The absorbtion of the tropical energy into the larger mean trough will develop a healthy storm that brings rain Thursday, wind Thursday night, much colder weather Friday. That's followed by the threat of frost Saturday morning. You can watch the energy merger at 500mb unfold in th

October has a long history of being one of those months that contains good, bad, and the ugly, sometimes all in one day. The transition from summer to winter is well underway with average highs going from the mid 60s to start to the low 50s by months end. Most years see several days in the 80s with the caveat being that freezing temperatures, frost, and at least a trace of snow is likely by the time November rolls around. We've enjoyed an exceptional warm spell recently that