Clouds Return
High pressure remains in control of our weather to start the week, but a competitor has arisen.
Low pressure is spinning this morning near the coast of the Carolinas. This low has a small chance of becoming classified as Tropical Storm Helene before landfall this afternoon.
The low will try to move northward, but the high pressure system will do its best to hold its ground. At least some minor shifts in our weather are expected as a result of this atmospheric struggle.
Sunshine will dominate most of the day, but thin clouds spiraling northward from the low will push into the area from south to north this afternoon. At first, these may not do much to limit the sunshine.
Tonight, however, the clouds will increase and then persist into Tuesday. Sunshine will still filter through, but it will not be the same full-on sunshine that we have grown accustomed to.
Temperatures will be influenced by the cloud cover as well. Today will be warm again, with highs in a similar 80-85 degree range as recent days.
Tomorrow, however, will be several degrees cooler, with highs ranging from the upper 70s to just above 80 degrees.
Nighttime temperatures tonight will stick to the upper 50s and low 60s again.
Winds will continue to be light. Wind speeds will vary between calm and up to 5 mph. Wind directions will vary between south and east, spending most of the time right in the middle from the southeast.
A few showers? Maybe?
Clouds associated with the low pressure system will linger for much of the week. There will likely be variations in the coverage and thickness of the clouds, so it is unlikely to be a week devoid of sunshine.
Those day-to-day variations in cloud cover and thickness will be hard to resolve more than a day or two in advance.
The chances for rain may be more straightforward but do still have some uncertainty as well.
While a few showers may be possible a couple times this week, generally speaking, most areas are probably going to end up dry.
The first chance for a few showers will be Wednesday, but the models are backing off on this potential as the high pressure system holds strong against the northward progression of the low. I am skeptical that any rain will make it into the area whatsoever.
Thursday should be dry with near-zero chances for rainfall.
On Friday, the low may reorganize itself off the coast of New Jersey. I could see a scenario where some showers sneak in from the southeast, but the model are not enthusiastic about the idea so far.
A new high pressure system will build in by the weekend, bringing sunny skies back into the forecast. Dry weather should persist into early next week, but rain chances look to increase late in the week.
Temperatures will continue to make a slow decline, with highs late this week mainly in the mid 70s. By Sunday and into next week, low 70s may be more likely with nighttime temperatures dropping to the lower half of the 50s.
Dry Weather Records
If we make it through next Tuesday without rain, that would be 15 straight days without rainfall.
For those going record hunting, there have been nineteen streaks longer than 15 days without rain, as reported at Cornell observation station*.
Twice, stretches of 23 straight days without measurable precipitation have been obtained (1894, 1963). It seems highly unlikely that we will even come close to those record holders.
Even matching the longest recent stretches of 19 days in 2015 and 17 days in 2012 seem like a long shot.
Interestingly, of those nineteen other 16+ day streaks, twelve came during the September-October-November season of meteorological fall.
* Note: I use the Cornell station as my go-to data source because of its lengthy, consistent history and its middle-of-the-road climatology that can serve as a proxy-average for the complex variations over our region.
Precipitation records, however, can vary significantly from location from location, even more so than temperature. For this back-of-the-envelope, mini-study, I did not look at other climate records in our region.
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This graphic represents an average over the entire Finger Lakes region. Localized variations should be expected.
