Posted 10:30 AM, Tuesday, 5/6/2008-Dave Longley- Another beautiful, sunny morning across the area.  Light winds are making it feel doubly nice.  Looks like I'll be able to finish up the yard work this afternoon. Jim Teske and I have been watching an area of clouds drop in toward us from the NW.  The clouds are drying up as they head our way, but we may see an increase in some clouds around here by mid afternoon.  There are showers showing up on the radar back across Michigan, but we've been hard-pressed to see anything hitting the ground.  We call that virga in meteorology...precipitation that dries up before hitting the ground. 

Do you know that weather balloons are still sent up into the sky twice a day, across the country?  They measure winds, and moisture and temperature high up into the sky, creating a sounding of the atmosphere.  The balloon sounding from Buffalo this morning shows some pretty dry air in the lowest 6,000 feet or so of the atmosphere, and I'm not surprised that moisture is drying up.  That'll be something to watch for this afternoon, but I think worst case scenario is we end up with a few sprinkles later this afternoon/evening and that's it.  Looks good for all the sports teams in CNY this evening, with temperatures falling to around 60 by 8 PM.

The rest of tonight will be dry, and then as winds turn into the south Wednesday, temperatures will warm into the 70s!  A cold front back to our west will be the main trigger for precipitation Wednesday night.  However, we're getting some indication from our computer models, that a few showers may try to form tomorrow afternoon, after 2 PM.  The chances for rain don't look to be all that great tomorrow; just wanted to give you a heads up.

Boy, some messy weather coming in across the southwestern US, will spread moisture our way Thursday and Friday.  I came in this morning and was pleasantly surprised that some drier air looks like it'll make a run at us later Thursday.  What looked like a rainy day, looks like we could see some sun later Thursday afternoon.  Woo-hoo!  The question will be if that dry air can keep another surge of moisture to our south Friday.  You'll see some sun in there for Thursday, and I kept the sun in for Friday, with just the chance of a few showers.

Now the weekend.  Most of our longer range guidance is showing a sunny Saturday, and increasing clouds with rain arriving Sunday.  I say most, because the ECMWF is showing rain Saturday and dry Sunday.  Where are the weather dice?  We're going to stick with the consensus now and keep the dry Saturday, rain arriving Sunday scenario.  That's what we've had since the weekend, and will stick there through this morning.

There you have it.  Questions, comments?

-Dave