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Forecast: April Showers Arrive on Cue
Mostly cloudy through Friday; weekend looks good
11:50 AM Update: Showers should hold off until after the lunch hour, and even then look to be scattered and mostly light during the afternoon into early evening.
EXPRESS FORECAST
Today: Cloudy. Chance of showers late morning into early evening. Low-to-mid 50s. | Tonight: Isolated shower through midnight. Fog & mist? Mid-to-upper 40s. | Tomorrow: Morning fog & mist? Partly to mostly cloudy. Near 60. | A Look Ahead
FORECAST IN DETAIL
Have you heard? The emergence of spring could bring a bear to your backyard (this is no April Fools' joke), but a wildlife expert says "you've got a better chance of dying from a bee sting than you do a bear." (That makes me feel sooo much better.) A less menacing but still gloomy rite of spring is multiday periods featuring clouds and occasional shower chances, another one of which starts today. The last such period tarnished a good portion of this past weekend. Will this one clear out in time for the coming weekend?
Today (Wednesday): I think we'll stay mostly dry through the morning rush before showers arrive by late morning or early afternoon. Light to moderate showers, with occasional breaks, are likely to last through the afternoon. Cloudy skies should limit highs to the low-to-mid 50s. Confidence: Medium
Tonight: Most shower activity should come to an end between approximately 6 and 9 p.m., though an isolated shower or two remains possible through around midnight. Skies stay mostly cloudy overnight, and some fog and mist could develop as well, with lows in the mid-to-upper 40s. Confidence: Medium-High
Keep reading for the forecast through the weekend, and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.
Tomorrow (Thursday): A light onshore breeze from the east keeps us partly to mostly cloudy tomorrow, maybe with some morning fog and mist, and afternoon highs near 60. Confidence: Medium-High
Tomorrow Night: Mostly cloudy with lows in the upper 40s to mid-50s and a chance of showers toward morning. Confidence: Medium
On Friday, a warm front followed by a cold front brings a breezy day and a good chance of showers and possibly thunderstorms. Despite cloudy skies, highs should make the 60s. Confidence: Medium
As of now, there's a decent chance we can clear most of the showers out of here around dinnertime Friday night. But still, an isolated shower remains a possibility through the evening. And it's likely to be windy through the evening and overnight with clearing skies and Saturday morning lows in the upper 30s (suburbs) to mid-40s (downtown). Confidence: Medium
I'm fairly confident we have a pretty nice weekend on the way. Saturday should be sunny, though rather breezy, with highs in the upper 50s to low 60s. And the early outlook for Sunday is looking splendid -- mostly sunny for much of the day with highs in the upper 60s, maybe even some low 70s. Confidence: Medium
By
Dan Stillman
| April 1, 2009; 10:00 AM ET
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Posted by: Bombo47jea | April 1, 2009 8:20 AM | Report abuse
We could use a little moisture robbing mesoscale hear in the central U.S. It will be quite some time before any planting can be done.
http://www.kansasvortex.com/
Posted by: eheadwest | April 1, 2009 12:06 PM | Report abuse
Thanks for your informative forecasts, gang. If I could ask a small favor... any chance you can include estimated precip amounts in your forecasts (when you expect rain, of course!)?
Posted by: lhaller | April 1, 2009 1:36 PM | Report abuse
Are you still expecting rain? None of the radars I see have any rain on them at all...
Posted by: hereandnow1 | April 1, 2009 2:23 PM | Report abuse
Oh, there's plenty of rain around. But it looks like this band to the west is about to give the metro area the split. Anything that falls this evening should be very light and short-lived.
Posted by: Brian-CapitalWeatherGang | April 1, 2009 2:40 PM | Report abuse
hereandnow1 -- There's an area of showers passing just north of Montgomery County as we speak, and a sprinkle or two off to the west and southwest. A sprinkle or light shower is possible over the next few hours, but doesn't look like it's going to amount to much if anything in the immediate metro area.
lhaller -- We often do include precip amount forecasts when we're expecting a significant storm or at least a solid area of precipitation. But such forecasts aren't so valuable or accurate when it comes to hit-or-miss showers (mostly 'miss' today) associated with weak fronts like today.
Posted by: Dan-CapitalWeatherGang | April 1, 2009 2:45 PM | Report abuse
ha ha we get a bear in our yard a few times a year here in madison but i never see deer
Posted by: deveinmadisonva | April 1, 2009 8:05 PM | Report abuse
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No dances between April 14 and April 21, except Monday nights...good time for a couple of good rainstorms???
As I posted earlier, we have another culprit in our rainfall-deficiency situations...those moisture-robbing mesoscale convective systems on the Florida panhandle. We seem to have another one down there this morning.