From Spring To Winter In A Couple Of Days...

Good Morning!

(Note:  You’ll recall me mentioning that I was recently the victim of bankcard fraud; some nice people were kind enough to hack my account and clean me out.  Until I get the damage from that swept up, some of the graphics of radar and such will be from alternate sources.  The data feed that drives Tru-Track Doppler is not free.  Additionally, my primary backup also has some outages for certain products.  We’ll get it done though!)

With that public service message out of the way, we have clouds in the area right now that will give way to some broken sunshine as the day progresses.  Let’s take a deeper dive and see what we have in store for the next few days!

THE THAW IS ON!:  That being said, please be careful walking or driving during the early morning!  All the snow that melts during the day refreezes at night, sometimes in clear fashion, leading to an icy adventure on the local sidewalks and streets!

I busted way low on the forecast for yesterday.  It actually got warmer under the cover of darkness with warm air on southerly winds advecting (moving in) into Jackson and south central Michigan as a whole.  The high in Jackson was recorded just before 10 PM last night at the airport, 44 degrees!  I’ll take that kind of a bust ANYTIME.  I’d rather have you prepared for colder weather and not need to be so bundled up than the other way around.  I do try to be accurate, because after all, what good is a forecast that doesn’t more or less verify?  At least it was a fairly straightforward exercise this time to see why it happened.

Here’s a look at the national temperature reports.  This is the mildest map I have seen in a couple of weeks!

The warmth continues through Thursday from what I can see here, with readings in the low to mid 40’s through then.  Varying clouds will change that by a couple of degrees.  Average is around 36 in this part of the world, and we slip below that and back into winter this weekend, on the back side of a low and associated cold front that brings us…

OUR FIRST SHOT AT SEVERE WEATHER:  For the first time in 2014, we have a risk area from the Storm Prediction Center to be concerned with.  Let’s look at this graphic.

You see the break point is just south of I-94.  Tomorrow you’ll want to be around a good source of warning information, just in case we do see some severe weather.  The best shot at truly severe storms appears to be down into Ohio & Tennessee, where they may see a spin-up tornado buried in a line of thunderstorms, as well as hail and strong wind.  Here, for now, we can’t rule out some gusty straight line winds that could break off a small tree or some power lines.  We’ll keep tabs on that for you as we get closer to Thursday.

I have to say that I am not terribly concerned at the moment with severe weather in Michigan.  Forecast models are not bullish at all on sufficient destabilization this far north for anything to get a foothold and really crank up.  If you’re talking about plain vanilla thunderstorms, a couple of them strong with some gusty winds, absolutely that could happen.  This threat goes away Friday, as we get into the cold air behind the front.  As the low and cold front work into and through, we cool down on the back side of it dramatically.  This time of year if you get into unseasonably mild weather, you usually pay the piper at some point with some vigorous storms.  We give 20 degrees back by the time we get into next week, and that brings us…

BACK TO COLD WINTER WEATHER:  Temperatures below normal, down into the mid 20’s and perhaps even colder as we note Arctic air building north of the border, and Old Man Winter ready to take the door off the hinges again…

Here's a look at forecast model output as labeled on the graphic.  You can see the cold stuff headed back at us as soon as Friday afternoon!

Enjoy the moderate weather while it’s here.

RAIN AND SNOW CHANCES MIKE?:  Yes.  We do need to talk about that.  Let’s look at the Weather Prediction Center 5 Day forecast map, that will take us into the weekend.  I could use the 7 Day, but the skill level tapers off quite a bit after 5 days…

It’s a very wet look for most of the US east of the Rockies.  Over an inch of liquid in this part of the world, and that seems reasonable.  Thankfully a good chunk of that falls as either rain, or snow that doesn’t stick to anything because of warmer ground.  Now I do expect that what falls will accumulate in some fashion, by the weekend, even if only minimal.  But for now, we’ll call it rain and snow showers mixed, mainly rain tomorrow, then back to snow for the weekend.

Here’s the forecast for Jackson and vicinity:

I hope that you have a wonderful day!  Blessings.