Forecast: Brief heat pop and then cooler

Comfortable weather comeback Thursday and Friday

* Number of 90+ days: 60 (Record: 67, 1980) | NatCast *
* Temps, clouds, webcam and more: Weather Wall *

Today's Daily Digit

 

A somewhat subjective rating of the
day's weather, on a scale of 0 to 10.

 

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Still a comfortably cool morning, but afternoon temperatures border on hot as we close in on 90 again.
 
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EXPRESS FORECAST

Today: Sunny and edge-of-hot. 88-92. | Tonight: Mostly clear and warmer. 64-71. | Tomorrow: Some clouds. 87-91. | A Look Ahead | Get Express Forecast by E-mail

FORECAST IN DETAIL

The big beautiful high pressure area that dominated our very nice holiday weekend is now starting a voyage across the Atlantic. Its departure means a turn of winds and the introduction of a little more humidity and heat. Fortunately, this week's heat story should be nothing like last week's upper 90s. Instead, we should only manage upper 80s to near 90 today and tomorrow before a new cool air mass arrives by Thursday and Friday.

Today (Tuesday): Mostly sunny skies today along with winds coming from the south are pushing our high temperature expectations up to the upper 80s and around 90. Slightly higher humidity adds to the mainly afternoon increase in discomfort, but it won't do much for all of us with new-found, dry weather allergies. Confidence: High

Tonight: Some clouds move in and combined with continued southerly flow, our warmest night of the week is likely. Look for lows mostly in the mid-60s (cooler suburbs) to low 70s (downtown). Confidence: High

Keep reading for the forecast through the weekend...

Tomorrow (Wednesday): A dry cold front sweeps through the area today. Some clouds roll through, but it looks like we can expect another mostly sunny day overall. Temperatures pop again into the mid-80s to around 90, but winds shift during the course of the day with more of flow from the west and northwest by afternoon/evening. Confidence: High

Tomorrow Night: Clearing and cooler with lows in the 50s to around 60 downtown. You'll be able to give your AC another much-needed time-out! Confidence: High

A LOOK AHEAD

Thursday and Friday are very similar weather days this week with mostly sunny skies and very comfortable high temperatures in the mid-to-upper 70s to around 80 (warmest downtown). Very low humidity means that allergens will be flying around again. Lows will continue to be in the 50s to around 60 under mostly clear skies. Confidence: Medium-High.

The weekend is still looking tricky with the potential for warmer weather (low 80s), more clouds, and showers. Rain this weekend may not be the best timing for those of you with plans, but the details are still very uncertain (the latest trends favor Sunday as the wetter day) and right now, an all-day rain-out seems unlikely. Since the DC-area has not seen rain since August 24, it may not be a bad thing to water down our dusty air. We are looking at only a 40% chance of measurable weekend precipitation at this point. Confidence: Low