Lead Forecaster Daniel Crawley
Good Friday to everyone, the weekend is upon us and you are probably wanting to know how the weather may impact your plans?
First off we are in pretty good shape across the Western Carolinas as warm but tolerable air (in terms of humidity) is overhead the region. Temperatures for Friday afternoon are going to top out in the upper 80’s which is a couple degrees from normal for mid July, dewpoints that have been routinely in the low to mid 70’s in recent times are a solid 8-10 degrees lower which makes a world of difference in terms of how comfortable it is outside.
The weekend is going to feature some changes in the pattern but it will be a slow, gradual evolution into a more humid and potentially stormy pattern.
Looking at the features around 5000-10,000 feet, southerly winds will develop on Saturday and that will slowly push moisture at the lower levels of the atmosphere back from the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic. This will slowly increase thunderstorm coverage on Saturday with the Blue Ridge favored as there is no good frontal boundaries nearly to serve as a trigger. Everything will be terrain induced.
On Sunday, changes are again not too drastic. Southerly winds aloft will continue to carry moisture aloft. The one difference is that a boundary will sliding into the Tennessee Valley by Sunday night. It will ultimately make it into the Carolinas by Monday finally increasing coverage of storms.
Any storms that do fire up this week will be more of the garden variety showers. Precipitable Water Values are down a bit (1.1 – 1.5 inches) compared to early this week due to the frontal passage we had late Wednesday night. Therefor the chances for heavy rainfall over the next 24-36 hours looks to be very limited.
As you can see on the loop, the PWAT values will get back in that (1.5 – 1.8 inch) range once we get to late Sunday and especially Monday. Any storms at that point will be capable to producing locally heavy rain.
Severe Weather potential also appears to be low this weekend with the limited moisture content and lack of a good trigger.
Most folks should be able to get in their outdoor events this weekend without much fanfare, should any showers develop they are expected to be short-lived in nature. For official 7-Day forecast click on the button below!