The Week Ahead

74 Comments

1:43AM

For some of us, it’s still the weekend on this Labor Day Monday. But for continuity, this post will do its typical look at the 7 day period Monday through Sunday.

What happens when the temperature and the dewpoint meet? The air saturates, and did that happen quickly in much of northeastern and east central MA during the first hour of the new day. We went from a mostly clear sky to heavy fog in a matter of moments. As the sun rises and goes to work on the fog bank where it is (not everywhere will fog in but many places will during the pre-dawn hours), the fog will thin and dissipate with sun taking over. A great day is in store!

Then begins a 3-day unsettled period Tuesday through Thursday. The heaviest and most widespread rainfall is now expected to take place Tuesday night and Wednesday morning. Getting the timing right on these is always a fun task. Anyway, some locations may see 1 to 2 inches of rain and even heavier amounts. The most likely area for the heaviest amounts as it stands now will be southern NH, but much of MA and even parts of RI can get in on the heavier action as well. A final cold front will pass through on Thursday, but it is unclear how much shower and thunderstorm activity will be associated with this. One thing is for sure, tropical humidity is going to be locked in for the 3-day period.

Friday and at least the start of next weekend look much better as high pressure moves in. However, Hurricane Leslie will be offshore in the Atlantic and sending large ocean swells to the New England Coast. Rip current threats will be high by the end of next week, and some areas prone to coastal flooding may see some, due to heavier surf and large swells. The storm itself will stay far offshore and never reach New England.

Eastern MA, southern NH, and RI forecast…

TODAY: Areas of low clouds and fog into mid morning then becoming mostly sunny. Highs ranging from near 70 immediate coast to near 80 well inland. Wind light SE.

TONIGHT: Increasing clouds. Lows 61-66. Wind SE under 10 MPH.

TUESDAY: Mostly cloudy. Episodes of showers and thunderstorms, especially in the afternoon. Humid. Highs 72-77. Wind SE 5-15 MPH shifting to S.

TUESDAY NIGHT: Cloudy. Showers and thunderstorms likely. Muggy. Lows 67-72. Wind S up to 10 MPH.

WEDNESDAY: Mostly cloudy. Episodes of showers and thunderstorms, especially in the morning. Tropical. Highs 77-82. Wind S 5-15 MPH shifting to SW.

THURSDAY: Variably cloudy. Chance of showers and thunderstorms. Low 64. High 82.

FRIDAY: Mostly sunny. Low 60. High 80.

SATURDAY: Mostly sunny. Low 58. High 77.

SUNDAY: Partly sunny. Low 55. High 76.

74 thoughts on “The Week Ahead”

    1. Earlier I thought we may break out of it all sooner on Wednesday but I had to shift a little wetter again at least the first half of the day. Timing these things can be a royal pain. 🙂

  2. Another nice early Sept day, 58.9 degrees, feels nice, temps don’t get much above 75 degrees today 🙂

  3. i had another good whale watch. I saw several individual humbacks and one breach.
    IN all the whale watches that i have taken(4 of them ) i have seen humbacks breach. i haveseen 6 different kinds of whales .2 dolphin species. 2 different kinds of seals. a basking shark. which is the cold version of the whale shark :P. and a mako shark. We have seen the whales and dolphins feed. and everything . Go to province town on cape cod and go on Dolphin fleet. It is the best one out there. It is the best out there.

    It is crazy how much Issac did in the form of flooding and damage. and how slow it is moving. it still has the counter clock wise form. and i believe that is what is going to effect us …. the remaints of Issac.?or the warm front that is comming off of it.

  5. This Monday morning feels chilly! Well, I am still in my room. I’m not outside yet…but the window is open and I have a blanket!

    2. Cool but not dry. Heavy fog this morning in my area and heavy dew on all surfaces.

      Broke out nicely by afternoon though. Very nice day. 🙂

    1. UGH!…HHH always seems to take forever to leave us once and for all. October can’t arrive soon enough for me.

  7. Skies are now clearing up nicely here in Boston with blue skies. They had better stay that way. I will be having my last BBQ of the season later this afternoon. 🙂

    3. You are all set! I am doing a small BBQ today too. Not sure if it’s the last though. For me, Endless Summer 2012 runs through September 30. 😉

  9. Sun started popping out around 9:00 here. We were in Wrentham and the clouds were hanging tough there with sun just starting to show at 11:00

  10. Will we be dealing with a tropical system next weekend? Is the GFS garbage? Are the Europeans trending westward?

    1. Coastal, what does the 12ZEuro look like? Remember which one was right for Isaac. Didn’t the Euro originally have it west near where it ended up?

            1. Trying…….I think I looked at the 12z EURO and at 192 hrs, it has a jaw dropping 947 mb hurricane east (couple hundred miles ?) of Nantucket…with an upper level low in the southeast.

  13. We will be dealing with a tropical system, but only rough surf and ocean swells. We’ll probably see the cloud deck in the east and if it’s a little closer some of those clouds may even spread back overhead in eastern areas.

    Euro’s solution is overdone in both intensity and westward positioning, in my opinion. You can tell that the model is confused about how to handle the system: tropical or mid latitude cyclone? The acceleration is messed up. It will move much more than depicted between 12z Tuesday and 12z Wednesday. I venture to say by Tuesday it will already be long gone. Watch what happens on the next 2 runs.

    12z GFS is decent.

      1. It did an OK job, but Isaac was a different animal and the synoptic set up is worlds apart from this one.

  14. Like 3 weeks ago when we took a few degrees off highs and lows, I think after late week we can take a few more degrees off and consistently be in the low to mid 50’s for lows, and mid 70’s for highs, love it 🙂 hope everything is well 🙂

    1. If you’re talking averages, yes. But day to day, there is no consistency like that in New England. We can have low temps in the middle 50s in January for a night or 2 if the pattern is right. It’s the variations that make up these averages.

      1. I guess I like the slow cool down, it’s like little steps, 90+ is long gone, not 1 90+ day yet since I think early Aug, hope all is well, another few weeks and it will be tough to hit 80+ 🙂

        1. I agree if I follow what you are saying. Maybe an occasional HHH but with the knowledge that it will quickly be followed by a falling feel. Works for me. The summer and august in particular were very typical new England summer. Time to move to fall. And then…….SNOW. But if we follow a Tropical system in between that works too

              1. Probably a couple days here and there. Anytime drier air comes in with these longer nights, it will cool off.

  15. Son just returned my car with some of our beach stuff…….along with a demolished left side. It was parked in Brighton yesterday and someone creamed it. Ugh. At least no one was in it and hurt

      1. If it was in Brighton, my bet is it was a moving van…college students are back. Most classes start tomorrow and beyond.

        Sorry about your car Vicki. 🙁

    5. I’m really sorry to hear about the news of your car, but thankfully your son was not injured! I have not had my car out the driveway since Saturday morning. It’s plain scary trying to drive around the area with kids driving these large u-haul trucks with absolutley no experience driving a truck, never mind any city driving experience! I’ll be happy when they’re all moved in and back to classes.

        1. Hey Vicki…there are cameras recently being set up on streets in Boston neighborhoods, even on side streets well off the main drags. Perhaps you could check the street where your son parked to see if there is a camera nearby. It is a longshot, but you never know. Cameras are becoming more widespread than you think. “Big Brother” has its good points and bad points. You would have to contact the Boston Police of course if you think it would be worth it assuming they are willing to get involved and investigate the accident.

    1. Yes, because some of the global models have it very close. I think only once in recorded history has a storm that has passed that close to Bermuda hit New England, and I’m not even sure how accurate that fact is. We just don’t get direct hits from those storms out there.

      1. TK. All tropical systems I remember have come up the coast. I also do not remember one from that far east. What is the one you mention. Also is it possible it could shift west south of Bermuda ? Irene sure took a turn not predicted until the last.

        1. TK, do you think that it could come this way because of the low over the southeast. Kind of like the rotating around effect?

          1. Barry mentions in his evening blog that strong NE winds and rain are possible from Leslie for next Monday. In fact, the lastest track is now just to the west of Bermuda…this morning tracks were over or just to the east. I wonder if this is going to be like in winter when the track varies a gazillion times all week long. We will see.

  18. The Leslie track was originally forecasted to be far east of Bermuda. Since then, the track has shifted to the west on a daily basis to the point where it could go west of Bermuda IF everything holds. But somehow I still seeing it go out-to-sea.

  20. I think all will see from Leslie is higher than normal waves. Its rare that a tropical system that is tracking towards Bermuda gives us a direct hit in New England.

  21. We all know the end result will be that it will pass well (over 250 miles) east of us, other than the immediate coastline it’s a nonevent, have a good night 🙂

  22. As I have said before, I’m not usually in the practice of criticizing the forecasts of other organizations, unless I’m doing so fairly and allowing the same to be done to mine.

    There is a FB “group” (not sure if it’s a group or one person) that I will not name here that has given priority to forecasting a Cat 4 hurricane off the Cape, producing hurricane force winds on the Cape and tropical storm force winds throughout eastern MA for SEVEN days from now.

    They have also issued their winter forecast already which is forecasting much above normal snow and much below normal temperatures (same forecast they had last year basically).

    They have abandoned updates on the upcoming rain event, however. This worries me, because in my opinion it’s a glaring example of exactly what is wrong in communication of very important information these days, be it via social media, TV, or any other source.

    Again I am not trying to trash them or anybody, but just stating my opinion on this.

  23. I have never seen anything other than very questionable “one-off” model runs to indicate Leslie would come in this direction. After Bermuda gets whatever it gets, Leslie should go on a sea voyage.

    My interest in Leslie is surf, tides & rip-currents which even the NHC has called possibly “life threatening.” In fact, here is there wording below.

    “HAZARDS AFFECTING LAND
    ———————-
    SURF…SWELLS GENERATED BY LESLIE COULD AFFECT PORTIONS OF THE
    LEEWARD ISLANDS…PUERTO RICO…AND THE VIRGIN ISLANDS FOR ANOTHER DAY OR SO. SWELLS WILL ALSO AFFECT BERMUDA AND THE U.S. EAST COAST FROM CENTRAL FLORIDA NORTHWARD FOR THE NEXT SEVERAL DAYS. THESE SWELLS COULD CAUSE LIFE-THREATENING SURF AND RIP CURRENT CONDITIONS.”

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