Thursday Forecast

94 Comments

7:36AM

DAYS 1-5 (APRIL 7-11)…
Milder today but unsettled ahead of a cold front though the heaviest and most widespread rain will be contained in a band that comes through later in the day and early this evening from southwest to northeast, and may even contain some thunder. Gusty winds will also be dominant. This area moves away to the northeast tonight but some unstable air still means a risk of rain showers at times on Friday. A
secondary front brings much cooler to colder air for the weekend. The wild card continues to be what happens with a developing ocean storm and whether or not its close enough to bring a period of snow Saturday night. Today, I’m going to split the difference and say part of the region, mainly southern MA and RI, stands some chance of getting into a ribbon of precipitation (snow that may start as a mix). What will not miss is wind and cold for Sunday. Looking ahead to Monday, the Red Sox home opener, it looks like the chill will begin to leave us, but this is often done with lots of cloudiness at least, and this time we can’t rule out some light mix/rain though this far out, odds favor that being further north and west and less so near Boston – but at 5 days away this is just an optimistic outlook.
TODAY: Cloudy. Scattered rain showers then an area of moderate to heavy rain arriving west to east late in the day. Highs in the 50s. Wind S 15-25 MPH with higher gusts.
TONIGHT: Cloudy evening with rain and a slight risk of thunderstorms, tapering off west to east. Mostly cloudy with isolated rain showers overnight. Lows in the 40s. Wind SW 15-25 MPH with higher gusts.
FRIDAY: Variably cloudy. Chance of rain showers. Highs in the 50s. Wind W 10-20 MPH and gusty.
SATURDAY: Variably cloudy. Chance of mix/snow mainly southern areas at night. Lows in the 30s. Highs in the 40s.
SUNDAY: Partly cloudy. Windy. Lows in the 20s. Highs around 40.
MONDAY: Mostly cloudy. Chance of light mix/rain mainly north and west. Lows around 30. Highs in the 40s.

DAYS 6-10 (APRIL 12-16)…
Cold front approaches April 12 with milder weather but a risk of rain showers. High pressure builds over eastern Canada and should be enough to keep unsettled weather to the south but also keep it on the cooler side, especially near the coast, April 13-15. Unsettled weather may return by the end of the period.

DAYS 11-15 (APRIL 17-21)…
Unsettled weather early in the period, then a drying trend again. Though it still looks like a blocking pattern, leaning at this time toward being more on the dry side of it. Temperatures closer to normal but typically cooler along the coast than inland during daytimes.

94 thoughts on “Thursday Forecast”

    1. I was a bit low on the Monday system. That one was tricky. I had a better handle on Sunday’s.

  4. Thanks TK. The RAP and HRRR show a solid 1-1.5″ of rain for most of the area later today. I’m not certain, but I believe most areas are near to a bit below normal on precipitation so far this year. I think we’re starting a transition from this very active period we’ve been in to a less unsettled pattern. It’ll be interesting to keep an eye on precipitation anomalies in the coming months. We appear poised for a very warm, and potentially dry, summer. However, going back to last year, even though the pattern has tended to be more dry than wet, we’ve gotten enough to fend off most drought issues so far. We’ll see if that continues through summer.

        1. Thank you.

          I’m surprised that it seems to include this area. I admit that I have absolutely no baseline for here. However, waterways seem pretty full to me. I’ve seen some overflow into yards.

          TK, perhaps you can explain how this is gauged. I’m assuming there is a soil test as well as just the amount of water in lakes, streams, rivers???

          1. Top soil and sub soil mainly, then river and lake levels. Short term rain/snow and runoff are taken into consideration.

  6. Boston may escape the snow Saturday TK . Thanks . Also my soon to be 12 yr old is begging me to ask TK what the weather will be like on his birthday April 16th as Siri told him rain lol . He is doing a musical performance outside and said it can’t rain .

    1. The bad news is ECMWF shows foul weather and the GFS is trending that way.

      The good news is the models don’t do too well trying to nail transitional patterns so they could be off and we may have fine but very cool weather. Check back!

  7. Good morning and thank you TK.

    I was wondering if you could offer up a technical explanation for why all the models
    portray hardly any precipitation much North of the low center. None of them.
    I find this to be highly unusual and am wondering why?

    Many thanks

    2. They seem to be forecasting a bit of convergence up top where you want divergence to draw air upward for more precip.

  11. HRRR says good chance of thunder and lightning in the 1-3 PM time frame.
    We shall see. 😀

  13. 12z NAM quite robust across CT/RI for the Sat night system. But looks like some boundary layer issues. Delivers 3-6″ for western CT but not much over eastern CT and RI with more rain introduced. Still, I think we could be in store for another surprise April pasting, at least in the higher elevations. Bulk of this looks to miss the Pike northward but still time to shift north.

    1. Yes, I would not yet rule this out for other parts of SNE. Not yet. In fact, we should all be on our toes. The cold that’s coming in is not as vigorous as what we got earlier this week, but it’s pretty darn close, especially inland. And system moving north will bump into a dome of cold air which usually means snow.

    1. Seems like if you are greater than 50 miles north of the low track with this thing, you are out of luck.

      JJ jackpots on this run. Looks like potential for another moderate snowfall across CT and RI.

      GFS is also colder than the NAM – starts as rain but then a quick flip to snow statewide. Seems more reasonable than the NAM with that dome of very cold air that this thing is bumping into.

      1. Here is my 2c…Too much dry air just to our north to overcome and not enough upper level support within the low itself to expand its precip??

        1. And even if I am totally off base, these clippers are moisture-starved as it is. GOM moisture is the only sure fire source for storm development.

  15. Was considering heading down to Brooklyn Sat night for the Islanders/Sabres game (I am a big Islanders fan). May have to reconsider as it is looking like the snow may be coming down heavy at times in the NY metro area late PM/evening.

    1. Friends head to that area this weekend for a dinner cruise out of NJ Sat night. Am concerned about them.

  16. I wasn’t expecting this lead area of rain to be as productive as it looks on radar.

    Its almost as wide and as intense as the band back in eastern NY State with the cold front.

    Central MA, RI and parts of NH look like they are getting a lot of rain.

    More showery here so far.

  17. Re : limited precip to the north of the low …..

    I think it is because New England is sitting in the center or base of the trof.

    If the trof was centered further west of us, like it is today and you had south or southwest flow above you, the storm generated precip would travel north and northeastward, much like it is today.

    But by the weekend, the bottom of the trof will be due south of us and so there wont be any flow above us to move the precip northward over new England. The precip is just going to follow the eastward translation movement of the trof.

    Now, follow the low just past New England, where Nova scotia will be east of the trof and under southwest flow aloft and you can see the precip and the low move northward at a further east longitude.

    1. Now that makes some decent sense. Don’t know if it is correct, but makes sense
      to me thank you.

      1. I don’t know if it’s correct either, LOL !!!!!! But I’m going with it 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

  18. CMC says C U LATER!
    Nothing brewing. The Ukmet, french and german have all trended South and out
    under us.

  19. It now seems as if the NAM and GFS take this the farthest North.
    Of course we are still waiting on the Euro, but I suspect it stays South as well.

    We shall see.

  21. The winds are really rattling the windows now.
    Lightning strikes showing up on Long Island.

    1. NWS indicated that the highest winds would be in Eastern sections as it is there
      where we are underneath the strong LLJ (low level jet).

      So, not surprisingly, you are not seeing the winds as strong. Keep in mind you are now considerably more inland than were you used to reside. 😀

    1. Yes, I did not expect this portion of the low pressure zone to be this active. See below.

  24. Trough #1 was WAY more productive than I figured it would be. Wonder if this leaves anything for trough #2 this evening…

    Regarding the weekend potential: A little higher confidence of a mostly-miss, but there is the possibility of a hybrid inverted or connecting trough that may pivot into southern sections, providing lift and light to moderate precipitation, rain or mix to snow, Saturday night. If this scenario plays out to full potential, several inches of snow would fall from southern MA and RI into much of CT, with virtually nothing from the Boston and Worcester areas northward. Margin of error is about 25 miles at this point in a verifying situation. Still a possibility the entire thing is far enough south to be a graze of mixed precip for the South Coast and nothing elsewhere.

    No sticking forks in anything yet, but odds favor less precip than more precip right now. Will continue to monitor in a reasonable way instead of making decisions with each model run. 🙂

    1. Ok, thanks. But no matter how you slice it, doesn’t look like much if anything at all for Boston? Correct?

      Sure doesn’t look like much to me.

      We shall see IF the NAM throws a surprise at us. 😀

      1. That possibility of the trough is concerning because we have seen situations like this before where models cranked out very little and we got a whole bunch, or at least a significant amount. So I want more confirmation that not much is going on before I pull the plug. 😀

  26. Just looked at 12z NAM and as Mark pointed out I am in jackpot. GFS much less snow where I am.

  27. Wall of water heading northward through Rhode Island.
    Looks like the radar of the rogue wave before it capsized the SS Poseidon!

  28. Man is it wet. Pouring here in Cambridge. I just checked my weather station and I have 1.39″ so far. 54 degrees at my house

  29. Very difficult to tell for sure, but the 18Z NAM “appears” to be coming in Farther North
    with More Precipitation to the North of the Center than previous. Could all go South
    an next frames. It is out to 42 hours and it took a dive South from hour 39 to hour 42, so what the bleep do I know. Watching.

      1. I predict this thing is coming closer to us than we think at this point in time. Will it be a direct hit? No. But, it’s still a watcher.

      1. I have the perfect way for you to understand. Winter will come back again in 8 months. Time to move on. I’m being funny 🙂
        It’s Springtime os!!

        2. He knows it’s Springtime. We’re analyzing a weather situation.

          It’s time for certain people to stop telling us it’s time to move on. We move on every day. You can’t reverse time.

  34. 32KM NAM takes the system harmlessly out South of us, while the 12km NAM
    throws precip up to boston and a tad farther North and West.

      1. What it’s doing it actually cutting itself off by building a very small almost inverted ridge. It shows up better on the higher resolution runs. Basically its orientation is such that it digs and tilts negative but closes off, and is small enough in size that it induces higher heights just east to north of itself, eventually wrapping around to the northwest side of the circulation at mid levels. So it almost puts up its own barrier and passes harmlessly to the south on these runs. This may very well be the correct solution and I’ll wait for confirmation on 00z’s. If I see it there, I’ll go with the miss, instead of just leaning that way without making a definitive call as I am now.

        1. Thank you TK. I was just going to post that the
          4KM NAM was a COMPLETE swing and a miss. 😀

    1. Anyways I have a feeling you did. He lost his battle with brain cancer. He is my bil’s brother. Funeral was today 🙁

        1. Way too young. So sorry Charlie. I didn’t know him but I found his obit, he was a year behind me.

          1. I did know him but not well. Saw him at holidays. Super sad to see a young healthy man turn into a very sick man in just 4 years. There was no cure. The trial medication aged him 10-15 years in 4 years of being diagnosed

            2. Very sad. My wife just learned of the death of a coworker tonight. She worked with him though not closely.

  37. Quinnipiac vs BC in game #1 of the Frozen Four semi-final.
    Game #2 is North Dakota vs Denver.

    I predict 2 underdog victories tonight: BC and Denver.

    Regardless of who it is, the 2 winners face off in the final on Saturday night.

    My old school (UMass Lowell) made a run at the Frozen Four but were eliminated by top seeded Qunnipiac.

    1. My father was Admissions Officer at UML for 23 years. He retired in December 1995. He passed away in January 2007. When he first started there it was called Lowell Tech I believe.

      1. Philip, UML is made up of two previous schools one of which was Lowell Tech the us Lowell University if I am not mistaking

        1. You are correct. It had a long run as University Of Lowell after the merger before UMass Lowell, which appeared the year after I graduated. 😉

      2. Wow what a run! It’s always so sad to lose loved ones, as I did lose my own dad last year as you know.

        My oldest brother attended “Lowell Tech” for a while in the early to mid 1970s.

    2. My son is at Northeastern, we went to the Hockey East semi finals with the triple overtime, great night of hockey, followed by the championship the next day! Great for NEU but not UML..,,

  38. I’m 75% miss and 25% hit now. I don’t care one way or another what happens personally, but I obviously know the overwhelming majority would just as soon see nothing. Still pretty chilly especially Sunday when the wind will be up.

    Sox home opener looks overcast and chilly with no more than a spotty ice pellet or rain drop. And more and more support for the wetter Tuesday and drier middle of next week, which was actually lead by the GFS. The CMC and ECMWF were much wetter for the middle of next week but the ECMWF went drier and the CMC is trending that way.

  39. Interesting sky 10 or so minutes ago.

    Moderate rain, but somewhere it was clearing enough to let the setting sun’s light through a big and it created a weird type of light.

    1. Sky got bright here, and literally a few hundred yards down the street at my brother’s house the sun came out with a rainbow visible, but not here. Very localized rainbow!

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