Monday, March 14, 2005
Mid-day Monday
Steve Scolnik @ 1:45 PM
Currently
At noon, temperatures were barely over 40 in most of the area, with a few spots, like Leesburg and Winchester, weighing in at 39. The following hour, temperatures had warmed to a range of 43-46 at the official reporting stations; I'm currently at 48. The radar is clear for hundreds of miles around Washington. With a strong sun (Yes, a week before the solstice, the sun is as strong is it was near the end of September.), and despite a northwesterly wind gusting over 20 mph, high temperatures should be in the mid 40's, or even upper 40's in some places, this afternoon.
Outlook
As Jason explained, the major weather excitement this week revolves around a low-pressure area moving out of the Gulf of Mexico and bringing rain to the Southeast on Wednesday. This morning's predictions from both major U.S. models bring this low eastward off the Atlantic coast south of us, so we could see little or no precipitation if that occurs. Given these results, the probability of precipitation would be less than 10%, but if precipitation did occur, the conditional probability that it would be snow would be generally 60% or more on Wednesday. This is credible given the upper-air flow predicted, but as we have seen, it's a bit early to be confident of precipitation amounts and type more than 48 hours away. Please give us your polite opinion on this, and the reasons why, in the comments.
At noon, temperatures were barely over 40 in most of the area, with a few spots, like Leesburg and Winchester, weighing in at 39. The following hour, temperatures had warmed to a range of 43-46 at the official reporting stations; I'm currently at 48. The radar is clear for hundreds of miles around Washington. With a strong sun (Yes, a week before the solstice, the sun is as strong is it was near the end of September.), and despite a northwesterly wind gusting over 20 mph, high temperatures should be in the mid 40's, or even upper 40's in some places, this afternoon.
Outlook
As Jason explained, the major weather excitement this week revolves around a low-pressure area moving out of the Gulf of Mexico and bringing rain to the Southeast on Wednesday. This morning's predictions from both major U.S. models bring this low eastward off the Atlantic coast south of us, so we could see little or no precipitation if that occurs. Given these results, the probability of precipitation would be less than 10%, but if precipitation did occur, the conditional probability that it would be snow would be generally 60% or more on Wednesday. This is credible given the upper-air flow predicted, but as we have seen, it's a bit early to be confident of precipitation amounts and type more than 48 hours away. Please give us your polite opinion on this, and the reasons why, in the comments.
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