A SPRING SURGE THAT'S SURE TO PLEASE...
It's been a little chilly around the edges that past couple of days as a late season surge of cold air reminds one and all that winter never gives up without a fight. Here's the trough at 500mb that's brought coats back into play.
You can see at both 5,000 and 30,000 feet the upper level flow is aligned from the northwest and that's a recipe for below normal temperatures.
At mid-day Thursday, most of us were 10-13 degrees colder than average.
On the high res-GOES 16 imagery you can see the leading edge of the cold reaching all the way to south Florida and well off the Mid-Atlantic coast.
What you cant see is the super dry air that's covering the nation. Dew points Thursday were only in the single digits which is next to nothing as far as moisture is concerned.
Available water vapor is at best around 1/10th of an inch. That's an arid air-mass. In fact, water vapor levels in Phoenix were 4 times higher than than those in Cedar Rapids and the Quad Cities.
As I mentioned above, winter never gives up easy in the Midwest but in the end, it always loses the war with summer. This weekend will be a perfect example of how fast things can change in April as we experience a big bounce in temperatures that will lead to very mild Easter weekend.
Notice the surface map Sunday. The surface high that delivered the recent cold is over the SE United States. A strong return flow of southerly winds is introducing mild air back into the pattern.
It results in a 500mb jet structure that looks like this. That should get us several days in the 70s! The first crack comes Easter Sunday, a day that looks like a lock for sunshine and highs near 70.
By the way, that's good weather for eating chocolate rabbits. As a kid I always got one of those big milk chocolate ones that were solid (not hollow) and came in a container. The beast weighed over a pound, was over a foot tall, and contained at least 3,000 calories. I would always devour the candy eyes first. It was a ritual and from there I went for the ears. I was a top down rabbit eater ending with the foot. I could usually make it last a couple weeks as there were Peeps and jelly beans to be had as well. I would trade the green jelly beans that had a weird minty taste to my younger sister for anything she would give up in return. I knew where her stash was and on occasion I would "borrow" a few just because I could. Those truly were the good old days.
Well, I reckon I'll finish with rain chances. With moisture being short I don't see much threat until Monday at the earliest. Chances appear to be greater in the period Tuesday through Thursday. At that time a front will be in the general area to provide some needed forcing. Moisture will also be significantly higher. Most models indicate the possibility of a surface wave along the front. For those in the warm sector (to be determined) there could be a severe threat mid-week. Models have come in with some decent looking rain totals. Most of this is between Tuesday night and Friday. This is all very preliminary and the value in the modeling is the overall trends as opposed to the exact amounts and precise placement.
The EURO rain totals.
The GFS rain totals.
With that, I say good Friday on what is "Good Friday". Enjoy the warming trend ahead, Easter weekend and as always, roll weather...TS
