Dry, then Wet, then Wintry?

Thursday 10 a.m.

With a weak high pressure area in charge, dry and pleasant weather should be the rule for the Northeast today and tomorrow. Showers are advancing across the western Great Lakes, and they could reach the Buffalo area tomorrow. The main weather maker this weekend wlll be a low pressure area and cold frontal system that will become better organized as they approach the East Coast.

There is still a lot of spread in model solutions for this storm. The European model develops a strong storm in the Carolinas on Sunday, then strengthens it even more as it heads to coastal New England on Monday. Such a storm would cause substantial rainfall from the Appalachians to the Atlantic coast. Then, as it slows down, moisture would wrap around the west side of the storm at the same time that chilly air pours in from the north. The result would be snow from the mountains of Pennsylvania up through central or eastern New York state.

The GFS starts with two storms, one near Maine and the other over Georgia, on Sunday. It then strengthens the northern storm as it moves into eastern Canada. If that happens, rainfall would be quite limited in the Middle Atlantic states, and by the time chilly air is drawn in from the north, it is too dry for much precipitation at all. Until the storm actually starts taking shape, the ultimate outcome will be uncertain.

This afternoon and evening, locally severe thunderstorms can occur from northernmost Texas to southern Iowa. Tomorrow, the area that seems to be at risk is much smaller.