Lead Forecaster Daniel Crawley
Good Wednesday to everyone, we continue to monitor a very hot weather pattern across the Western Carolinas thanks to a stout upper level Ridge that is parked overhead.
Looking at the water vapor image early Wednesday morning shows the ridge firmly in place over the southeast and it will center itself across Western North Carolina later today. Also if you notice there is not as much thunderstorm activity on the northern extent of the ridge.
The so-called “Ring of fire” allowed a complex of thunderstorms to move south across North Carolina early Tuesday morning and that played havoc on the forecast.
We will start today with a lot more in the way of sunshine across the region and that is going to allow for a very hot day, the combination of heat and humidity could create some locally dangerous conditions.
High temperatures today are expected to reach the mid to upper 90s across the foothills and Western Piedmont. The combination of temperatures and high humidity will allow heat index values to once again get into the triple digits.
Foothill locations will see heat index values between 100 and 103 while the piedmont could see valleys briefly exceed 105°.
The combination of heat and humidity in a weakly capped atmosphere is going to create high amounts of instability that could be tapped into if there was some trigger.
With the lack of an MCS, it may take some terrain effects to help spark off isolated to widely scattered storms today.
One thing of note is how the winds just off the surface are going to veer from a northeast direction to an easterly component late this afternoon and tonight a southerly component.
The upslope component might turn out to be the trigger to activate convection this afternoon and evening. With 500 and 700mb winds light and anticyclonic above the upslope flow, some anchoring of cells can’t be ruled out.
This pattern will continue on Thursday and then slowly begin to break down by Friday.