8:57 AM

Those that had sporting events last night, like the Yankees last night, mainly were spared the worst conditions due to high pressure strengthening over New England.  The high pressure strengthening combined with the low progression of the coastal low kept much of the heavy rain south of the Bronx, which allowed the Yankees to escape a rather complicated schedule if a rain out was the result.

As for the snow threat, which was a complete bust by everyone from myself to the National Weather Service, the reason for the lack of snow for most locations comes down to two point.  One, the heavy precipitation shield was just not as expansive as forecasted.  Two, the marine air mass continued to overwhelm the cold air at the mid and upper levels as the 850 MB low remained south of the region, which prevented the air mass at the higher elevations to cool.  Therefore, the higher elevation snows never materialized.

Surface Map at 8 AM- Penn State E-Wall

This morning, the coastal low is moving past the Maryland/Delaware coastal waters and is slowly moving towards the New England coastal waters.

The majority of the rain with this coastal low is focused along the coast with periods of moderate to heavy downpours.  The upper level trough that is supporting the development of the coastal low is expected to slowly tilt towards a negative position, which will force the coastal low to stall just east of Long Island through tonight and into tomorrow morning.  As a result, rain will continue to move in from the Atlantic towards the Coastal Plain over the next 24 hours.

There will be a sharp cut off in the precipitation shield that will develop through the afternoon today.  Basically if you follow these two rules, you’ll know what to expect.  If you are east of the Delaware River then periods of moderate to heavy rain can be expected.  If you are to the west of the Delaware River by 50 miles, expected light to moderate scattered showers.  If you are over 50 miles west of the Delaware River, a few passing showers, overcast skies, and an annoying northerly wind.

The rainfall amounts through tomorrow morning will still be impressive, however the focus now a bit further north and east at this point.  The heaviest rainfall will be found over much of central and southern Connecticut, Long Island, the southern Hudson Valley, the fiver boroughs of New York City, northeastern New Jersey, and down through northern Monmouth County, New Jersey with 1 to 2 inches of rain expected.  To the west of this area including much of central New Jersey and the northern Delaware Valley, rainfall amounts of 0.50″ to 1.00″ can be expected with an increasingly more scattered nature to the rainfall towards the west.  Finally, southern New Jersey and much of the western suburbs of Philadelphia can expect less than a half inch of rain by Monday evening from this event going forward.

Winds will remain an issue with a tight pressure gradient in place.  Winds along the coast and coastal waters will continue to remain around 15 to 30 mph with higher gusts to 45 mph while away from the coast, winds will range from 10 to 20 mph.  Winds will continue to veer from the northeast to northwest as the low pressure system slowly moves past the New Jersey coastal waters.

Once this low pressure system exit the region by tomorrow afternoon, a nice stretch of weather conditions can be expected as high pressure takes hold of the region.  Clear skies and dry conditions can be expected through Friday with temperatures rising to average to slightly above average levels.  In short, the 60′s return!

500 MB on Saturday Afternoon

A strong ridge will build over much of the East coast through this week, however a strong cold front with several waves of low pressure along the frontal boundary will move through the region on Saturday with periods of heavy rain.  There is some debate on the strength of the Polar air mass behind this cold front between the GFS and ECMWF, however one aspect that is not in contention is the slow nature of the cold front and the threat for yet another wet weekend for the northern Mid Atlantic.

Finally, I saw an interesting feature on the ECMWF this morning that gave me pause.  The ECWMF develops a strong TROPICAL low pressure, likely a hurricane on this guidance, that moves from the Caribbean Sea towards the eastern Gulf of Mexico.  Besides the serious

ECMWF Hurricane Threat?

nature of such an event along the Gulf Coast (especially the Panhandle of Florida), this tropical system would have a few important influence on the evolution of the pattern towards the end of this month in terms of heavy rain fall and potential enhancement of any disturbance that happens to be dropping into the eastern trough at that time.  I’ll keep tabs on this potential and we’ll see what develops.