Rainy Conditions and Cooler Temperatures Pushing Into the Northeast

A dreary weather pattern is in store for the Northeast for the first few days of May. Forecasters are predicting that a front will stall out over the region, leading to several days of cloud cover, rain, and cooler temperatures. Here is a look at this gloomy forecast for the northeastern corner of the country.

Northeast in Store for Cloudy and Wet String of Days

The Northeast is going to have to wait a bit for more summerlike conditions. It has already been an unsettled spring season for the region thanks to a parade of storms that have marched across the country with great regularity in recent weeks. Now forecasters are warning that an atmospheric traffic jam is going to trigger the threat of locally severe thunderstorms on Thursday and Friday.

The models suggest that the rain will come in two distinct parts. The first wave of moisture will last from Thursday night through Saturday, targeting the Appalachians and to the west. The second batch of moisture will erupt on Sunday and linger for the first few days of the new week. This wave will set up farther to the east and the south, impacting the mid-Atlantic coastal areas and over to the central Appalachians.

Washington, D.C., could see a stray thunderstorm ignite on Friday just in time for the evening commute. The nation's capital is forecast to see a toasty end to the work week with a high of about 86 degrees and lows that dip to the upper 60s. It will be slightly breezy with winds out of the southwest at 10 to 15 mph.

You will find a similar unsettled and warm forecast up the road in Philadelphia. The City of Brotherly Love will see the greatest chance of a thunderstorm during the late afternoon hours as the mercury climbs into the mid 80s.

Other metro areas that should prepare for the threat of damaging winds, hail, and downpours on Friday include Cleveland, Buffalo, and State College, Pennsylvania. Unfortunately, those in State College are still recovering from the stormy activity from earlier in the week.

What About the Weekend Forecast for the Northeast?

The late-week severe weather event will bring a number of impacts, including strong winds, hail, flash flooding, and isolated tornadoes. The rain will linger through the start of the weekend for many areas.

For instance, Pittsburgh is bracing for a soggy Saturday. The Steel City is forecast to pick up rainfall of about a half of an inch during the day with another quarter of an inch tacked on overnight. Temperatures will fall with the arrival of the front, tumbling from highs in the mid 70s on Friday to readings that struggle to climb out of the low 60s on Saturday. Overnight lows will bottom out in the mid 50s.

Rather than moving offshore at a normal speed, this front is expected to slow down and stall when it reaches the Appalachians. This stall will translate to persistent clouds, rain, and the chance of thunderstorms across a large portion of the Southeast, the Midwest, and the Northeast.

While the rain will be sporadic in nature, some areas may see a more persistent stream of moisture. This could result in an inch or more of rainfall in the hardest-hit communities.

Two Potential Scenarios Heading Into the New Week

The forecast becomes a little less certain after Saturday. The initial storm system could accelerate and move offshore by the end of the weekend. The Northeast would then see drier but chillier air seep in on Sunday. The temperatures could dip low enough that the interior portions of the Northeast may be dealing with frost concerns late Sunday and into Monday.

Another possibility is that a new storm may come to life in the jet stream level of the atmosphere across the eastern U.S. Depending on where this potential storm sets up, some parts of the region could continue to see the dreary weather, rain showers, and thunderstorm activity into the early part of next week.

Meteorologists are busy studying different forecast models to determine where the unsettled weather will remain and who may begin to see clearer conditions. The difficulty in this forecast is that storms forming in the jet stream level are notoriously challenging to predict. However, this is the time of the year when these storms are the most common. Where exactly it sets up and what direction it heads is still unknown.

It is significantly easier to forecast storms that come together at ground level due to the amount of prediction tools available to meteorologists. Forecasters need to send weather balloons and the accompanying instruments up into the atmosphere to pluck data from these levels. The data points, such as temperatures, wind speeds, and humidity levels, are then used to determine a forecast.

Regardless of where the system eventually lands, the moisture associated with the event will likely be enough to create travel disruptions both on the roads and in the air. Low clouds will be the most significant disruption to air travelers.

Additionally, some of the barrier islands along the Atlantic and low-lying areas in the region of the Chesapeake and Delaware bays could notch above-normal tides. This would result in a higher chance of coastal flooding.

There is also the chance that a stalled storm could send a plume of moisture from the Gulf and the Atlantic Ocean over the southeastern coast of the U.S. This moisture could also reach the mid-Atlantic. The bottom line is that none of the eastern U.S. is safe from this stalled front as of yet. We will continue to monitor the latest forecast models and update accordingly.

May Gray Despite the Start of Solar Summer

The typical "May Gray" setting up over the Northeast in the days ahead is coming despite the start of the solar summer. Weather experts lean on a variety of data points to quantify the start of the summer season. For most everyday Americans, the Memorial Day weekend represents the unofficial start to the season.

Meanwhile, weather forecasters use the date of June 1 to mark the beginning of the meteorological summer. This differs from the astronomical summer, a date that arrives with the summer solstice later in June.

Solar summer is an entirely different version of the seasonal marker, encompassing the months of May, June, and July as the parameters. These three months are when the most sunlight shines on the Northern Hemisphere as a result of the Earth's tilt on its axis.

Although the Northern Hemisphere sees the greatest concentration of sunlight during these months, it is not typically the hottest time of the year. Instead, the hottest time of the year is generally referred to as the "dog days of summer." This period begins on July 3 and wraps up on August 11. The term comes from the period of 39 days when the light from the star Sirius is the brightest. Astronomers once believed that the additional light added heat to the Earth's atmosphere.

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