Weather! Chilly, blustery weekend in store

This morning, as you wake up, a strong cold front is sweeping across Virginia. But don’t get your hopes up, snow is pretty much out of the question.

January 13, 2012; 10:12 AM • by Weather Dan

When the sun went down yesterday, Richmond was enjoying warm temperatures despite the cloudy skies. Yesterday’s high of 63 was 16 degrees above the average high for January 12 of 47 degrees.

This morning, as you wake up, a strong cold front is sweeping across Virginia. While it was still 52 at RIC at midnight, Blacksburg was already down to 34, and Hot Springs was down to 28. The front has continued to swing east overnight, propelling some limited areas of rain eastward across the state, and pulling in snow showers across the western mountains.

As of 7am, here’s where we stand:

The front has mostly cleared the state at this point, but you can still see a sharp gradient — while temperatures are still around 40 at Norfolk, it’s 23 in Marion and a chilly 16 in Hot Springs. Strong, gusty winds are moving in behind the front as well, with sustained winds as high as 20 mph in places, and gusting to 30 or 40 mph – or higher.

Friday: If you wished for clear skies and warm temperatures today, I recommend just going back to bed. It’s not worth setting yourself up for the inevitable disappointment that’s going to come as soon as you open the front door. We’re only going to rebound to the low 40s today; with sustained winds of 15 mph, we get wind chill values in the low 30s. Winds will continue to gust to 30 to 40 mph through the afternoon, beginning to die down around sunset. Winds will continue to blow at 10-15 mph overnight, with a low in the mid 20s. Wind chills overnight may reach into the teens.

Saturday: Not much improvement happens on Saturday, other than a decrease in wind speeds. High temperatures will reach to near 40, and west winds will reach speeds between 10 and 20 mph. Wind chill values will again be in the low to mid 30s during the day. Lows fall back into the mid 20s, with light winds.

Sunday: Still cold, but the winds have died back. Highs will make it into the low 40s with partly to mostly sunny skies. Lows Sunday night again fall into the mid 20s.

By the time Monday rools around. we’ll see temperatures quickly try to rebound back to their above-normal tendencies. Temps will make it into the 50 before our next system of interest comss rolling through. I don’t think well see much – if anything – in the way of precip from that system, and again, we’ll be in the warm sector, so getting any snow is likely out of the question. Will see ever see some winter precip? Only time will tell.

January 13, 2012 10:12 AM 0