Weather! It’s an umbrella kind of day

If you don’t want to get wet today, I’d recommend either taking an umbrella or just staying home and in bed.

August 18, 2010; 9:31 AM • by Weather Dan

If you don’t want to get wet today, I’d recommend either taking an umbrella or just staying home and in bed.

Roanoke.com’s Kevin Myatt points out that the last time both Roanoke and Blacksburg saw an inch of rain in a single day on the same day, none of it actually fell as rain. In Richmond, the last day we saw more than an inch of rain in a single day was March 25, when we saw 1.25” of rain fall at RIC.

The cold front that has been approaching the region is finally here and virtually stationary over the area, setting up a conveyor belt that is pulling in warm, humid air from the Gulf of Mexico. When it interacts with the cold airmass, we get rain. And since the boundary isn’t moving, we’re set up to get quite a bit of rain. Between midnight and 4 AM, we’ve already picked up 0.72” of rain. It’s worth noting that between March 25 and today, we’ve only received more than 0.72” of rain once – 0.89” on August 5.

For the rest of Wednesday, expect overcast skies, with periods of rain and an occasional thunderstorm. Highs today will stick in the mid 80s, and lows tonight will drop to around 70.

The front sticks around the area into Thursday. There’s a possibility that the remnants of TD 5, still hanging around the Gulf Coast, could provide us with an additional shot of moisture (and even more rain). Even if we don’t see that extra moisture (and satellite images early Wednesday morning don’t have it moving a whole lot just yet), we’ll still see some good rain chances for most of the day, and they will finally start to diminish on Thursday evening as the front moves off to the southeast. We’ll start to see another small warmup, as temperatures climb back into the mid 80s. Overnight lows should drop into the lower 70s.

Looking ahead to the weekend, high pressure will take control again, albeit with slightly cooler weather. Expect partly cloudy skies most of the weekend, with highs around 90 and lows around 70, with the chances for some isolated or scattered thunderstorms each day. I’ll have a complete update on Friday morning.

August 18, 2010 9:31 AM 1