Don't Get Used To It

Posted by Chris Lambert

Let's be honest, the past winter and a half, hasn't been tough to take across New England.  Cold doesn't sustain itself, what snow falls, melts fairly quickly, and temperatures have averaged 4-5 degrees above the norm. 

It all has to do with how pressure patterns across the northern hemisphere set-up.  When the Arctic has a strong polar vortex (low pressure across it), cold air tends to stay bottled up across Alaska, northern Canada and the Arctic. That's what we've seen quite a bit of recently, with only brief breaks in that pattern.  When high pressure builds across the West Coast, Alaska, Greenland and much of the Arctic, cold air is displaced toward lower latitudes, including the central and eastern United States.  That's similar to a pattern we saw in Jan and Feb of 2011,  parts of the 2009/2010 winter and in mid Jan-Feb of 2007.   This is also similar to the set-up next week, and perhaps more often than not, over the next several weeks.

In this more wintry pattern, the obvious:  the cold is coming.  What's tough to pin down, is the storm track.  Meaning, while I'm highly confident in cold air blasting into New England this week, with perhaps more early February cold spells, I'm less confident in guaranteeing big snow storms.  Although, you need the cold to get the snow, so at least that's in place.  Sometimes it can just be cold and dry though, like much of the mid Jan-Feb of 2007 we had.  With the snow... we'll wait to see what happens.

A couple chances of snow are in the forecast with some snow late Monday night and Tuesday morning, steadiest over SE Mass, and perhaps a more widespread and heavier storm possible Friday. 

The coldest stretch of weather will be Tuesday night - Thursday morning.  Expect near 0 degrees readings in the morning, and teens for highs Wednesday afternoon.

So don't get too used to the milder air this weekend, it's days are numbered.  Oh... and go Pats!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Trying Times

Posted by Jeremy Reiner

These are indeed trying times and an unsettled weather pattern that is just relentless. It's a pattern we saw back in February-March. Thankfully this time of year the strength of this pattern is much weaker than the winter. Despite that fact, check out this stat:

It's Getting Old

Posted by Pete Bouchard

Another round of rain...and cool temperatures. June is living up to - or should I say down to - expectations. Some years, we can sneak out a pretty decent start to summer. Others, you need to 'wait for it'. This may be one of those.

One Down, One to Go

Posted by Jeremy Reiner

Round one of today's rain is departing stage right (as of 7am) and now we have several hours of just mainly cloudy skies before round 2 arrives. This latest storm is coming at us in two pieces--sometimes that happens, like today! During this lull you can plan on lots of clouds (some sun too) and humidity thanks to the 2" of rain the ground couldn't quite absorb last night.

Another Soaker - Flood Watch Posted

Posted by Chris Lambert

Scattered showers roll in early this evening, only to become a steadier and heavier rain overnight.  The heaviest rain and thunder roars from 9:00PM-4:00AM.  During that time, localized street flooding and flooding of poor drainage areas become a concern.  Many towns pick up about 1" of water tonight.