monsoonmartin

Monsoon Martin's Weekend Update and Go Mustangs! Forecast

Friday, 30 November 2007

Weather narrative: Sunny and cool today; a cold front will move through this evening, ushering in (as the name suggests) colder temperatures. Saturday looks to be quite chilly with highs only reaching the upper 30s and a stiff northeast wind blowing. Snow showers may develop after midnight and continue overnight ahead of a winter weather system heading into the area.

On Saturday night, Governor Mifflin will play Harrisburg at Hershey Stadium for the Class 3/6-AAAA football championship. As the game begins (7pm), we’ll see mostly cloudy conditions and a temperature of 34, with wind chills in the upper 20s. Clouds will increase and temperatures will slip to (or even just below) freezing as the game goes on, but I am confident that precipitation will hold off until the game ends and everyone gets home safe and sound. If I might also offer another prediction for Saturday night: Governor Mifflin 21, Harrisburg 16.

Now to the winter weather system that has had everyone buzzing this week: I think, over all, it’s going to be a disappointment. Here’s what to expect…morning snow showers, mixing with sleet by 8 or 9am, then turning to rain by the noon and continuing as rain through the early evening. Precipitation will taper by late evening, but cloudy conditions will persist. Accumulations will be negligible everywhere but the northern Lehigh Valley and Pocono region. My call is an inch to an inch and a half of snow Sunday morning for most of my forecast area, with steadier rain washing it away later.

Monday’s looking like a windy, bitterly cold day with a very cold start, so there’s a chance some of the precipitation that falls on Sunday will freeze on Monday morning. For that reason, I’ll cover my bases with a 20% chance of school delays for Monday. The weather for Monday looks like this: mostly cloudy with a slight chance of a flurry or brief snow shower in the morning; then a slight chance of drizzle or a spot of rain in the afternoon. Quite windy with WNW winds 16-20mph, gusting above 25. High 40, low 26. Wind chill values will be in the teens in the morning and the 20s for much of the day.

The rest of the week will be cold with highs only in the mid 30s as we see the coldest temperatures so far this season. I’m looking at Thursday for a possible system, but I don’t think it’s anything to get alarmed about. The conditions just aren’t right yet for a “big one.”

Cold for the following weekend, too, with highs only getting into the low to mid 30s.

And the following week will see…you guessed it…more of the same.

Beyond the forecast: Still very cold—unseasonably so—with snow possible on Thursday the 13^th into Friday the 14^th. Then warming slightly to “normal” temperatures for this time of year (highs in the low to mid 40s; lows in the mid to upper 20s).

Monsoon