Twin Tiers Weekend Outlook

Yesterday I monitored several complaints about a very limited number of snowflakes that fell yesterday, stemming from a cold front and, yes, a touch of lake enhancement. That, as of Saturday morning, has ended. Temperatures will begin an upward climb out of the basement today and will stabilize at more springlike norms in the coming weeks.

High pressure moving up from Appalachia will keep the weather mostly clear for Saturday. Very weak precipitation (this time likely to be all rain, which will probably not be anything measurable) will move in from the northwest on Saturday night but should be out of the area by Sunday morning. From that point it is mostly clear for the rest of the week. The next body of precipitation appears to be relatively neutral temperature-wise and won’t affect us until at least Thursday.

Saturday: Mostly clear. Afternoon high temperatures in the mid-50s. Some very limited rain showers Saturday night.

Sunday: Rain clears out by Sunday morning. Early lows around 40. Clear skies, warmer; afternoon high temperature in the low 60s.

Monday: Mostly clear, slightly cooler. Early morning lows in the mid-30s, lower in the valleys and mountains. Afternoon highs in the low-to-mid-50s.

Tuesday through Friday: Some precipitation appears to be headed our way, but the timing of it is still somewhat uncertain. The GFS has it arriving on Friday, but the ECMWF has it lagging slightly behind that. In regards to temperature, the MRF perturbations generally have us in the upper 50s for Tuesday and Wednesday, slowly rising into the low 60s for Thursday and Friday. There does appear to be a little bit of normalizing bias kicking into the GFS-MOS on Friday, so don’t be surprised if we see mid-to-upper-60s for Friday before subsiding back to around 60 for Saturday.

Long range: The GFS is forecasting a brief shot of cooler air to come around next Sunday (4/18) dropping our high temperatures back to around 50 (maybe even upper 40s), before that moderates and high temperatures rebound to the mid-to-upper 50s for Monday 4/19 and Tuesday 4/20. The Climate Prediction Center is predicting temperatures to average above normal and precipitation to be drier than normal for the period of April 15 to 23; I am not so confident of this forecast and am more inclined to forecast temperatures of near normal for the next two weeks. Update 4/11: As I suspected– the CPC has revised its forecast downward this morning and is forecasting normal-to-below-normal temperatures for April 18-24. (Average high temperature for April 10 in Little Valley is 50 degrees, and by April 23 it is 56 degrees. April tends to be a time of comparatively rapid warmth, with climatological norms climbing one degree every two days or so.)

Forecast Audit: All in all, the last forecast went very well. The main problem was my characterization of the rain from this past week. I had characterized it as a washout, when in fact there was significant dry time, particularly on Wednesday. I should have better conveyed the sporadic nature of the rain that had come. The cold front on Thursday afternoon was predicted fairly well, though it was a couple of hours later than I had anticipated and this led to warmer highs than I had forecast as a result. I know that I did not mention snow in the last forecast– that was intentional. While I saw the possibility of a few flakes, I did not see it accumulating or causing any problems, so I figured that I would label them generic “showers” and save myself a few headaches from angry patrons.

Next forecast: Tuesday, 4/13.

~J.M. Fuller