Just 15 minutes after saving the radar scan below, the Vernal Equinox passed. It's Spring, saddle pals! With a little more rain in our coffers from the past few hours, the grasses and plants and puddle-flapping birds will be happy little campers today.
And we got our modest rain shot it in a 'good' way...the driving center of low pressure lifted up through eastern TN yesterday, taking with it the bulk of the severe weather. Rains were not that heavy, but the PTI airport had picked up right at 0.40" total at last check, with the last of the last falling. Not too shabby.
This is my radar scan from ~1:33 AM, and there's our cold front passing, showing up via the linear bands passing down through the Triad. "Official" almanac data has yet to be processed this morning, but on the preliminary report I did see a peak wind gust of 40 mph with highest sustained speed at 33 mph, so that verified. Best part of all was not dealing with severe weather and getting a nice soaking rain.
Big weekend ahead for travel, outdoor plans, family gatherings, and lots of special new outfits catching a breeze Sunday. Late yesterday afternoon I was trying to look and plan ahead for post office and bank holidays this weekend...and maybe I've just been asleep at the switch, but I was really surprised to see that neither Friday nor Monday is a holiday for either. Now, I'm sure some of you knew this all along...I guess with a lot of school holidays around this time, I assumed Easter was in some way on the Federal Reserve's official holiday schedule - but it's not.
I put this information in my weather forecast write-up yesterday for the Triad and thought you might like to know about "white" Easters, since it's so early this year (March 23). With Easter's date hopping around like Petey Cottontail, I never found specific data for snowy Easters...but I did pull some interesting tidbits from the records kept at Piedmont Triad airport since 1929:
Greatest snow total for March 23:
4.6" (1981)
Latest measurable snow:
March 30 - 1.2" (2003)
Latest 'trace' of snow:
April 24 (1955)
Why the talk of snow? For several days several models have been doing an even bigger Hokey-Pokey than normal with next Monday's forecast. Today through Saturday will be sunny and pleasant in the 60s, maybe even 70 by Saturday...then a strong cold front drops Sunday's highs into the mid-upper 50s, with a Gulf low quickly riding up along that front and making for a crashing cold and rain-snow mixed Monday (40s for highs) before quickly pulling out Monday night. That's been the gist of it.
Not surprising to see forecast runs flip-flop given the volatility of weather at this big change of seasons, and one of my favored numeric models this morning has Monday warmer and drier...will be interested to see the 06Z runs later this morning to see if others have taken their left leg out or it they're shakin' it all around...that is what it's all about.
Nice thing about this time of year is that really cold temperatures can't hang around too long with the ever increasing sun angle and southerly jet getting stronger. And though there are some forecast lows that flirt with the freezing mark, we don't have the set-up for something like last year's record killing-freeze Easter morning.
Time to hoof it in...and get that &*$# "Hokey-Pokey" song out of my head...
And we got our modest rain shot it in a 'good' way...the driving center of low pressure lifted up through eastern TN yesterday, taking with it the bulk of the severe weather. Rains were not that heavy, but the PTI airport had picked up right at 0.40" total at last check, with the last of the last falling. Not too shabby.
This is my radar scan from ~1:33 AM, and there's our cold front passing, showing up via the linear bands passing down through the Triad. "Official" almanac data has yet to be processed this morning, but on the preliminary report I did see a peak wind gust of 40 mph with highest sustained speed at 33 mph, so that verified. Best part of all was not dealing with severe weather and getting a nice soaking rain.Big weekend ahead for travel, outdoor plans, family gatherings, and lots of special new outfits catching a breeze Sunday. Late yesterday afternoon I was trying to look and plan ahead for post office and bank holidays this weekend...and maybe I've just been asleep at the switch, but I was really surprised to see that neither Friday nor Monday is a holiday for either. Now, I'm sure some of you knew this all along...I guess with a lot of school holidays around this time, I assumed Easter was in some way on the Federal Reserve's official holiday schedule - but it's not.
I put this information in my weather forecast write-up yesterday for the Triad and thought you might like to know about "white" Easters, since it's so early this year (March 23). With Easter's date hopping around like Petey Cottontail, I never found specific data for snowy Easters...but I did pull some interesting tidbits from the records kept at Piedmont Triad airport since 1929:
Greatest snow total for March 23:
4.6" (1981)
Latest measurable snow:
March 30 - 1.2" (2003)
Latest 'trace' of snow:
April 24 (1955)
Why the talk of snow? For several days several models have been doing an even bigger Hokey-Pokey than normal with next Monday's forecast. Today through Saturday will be sunny and pleasant in the 60s, maybe even 70 by Saturday...then a strong cold front drops Sunday's highs into the mid-upper 50s, with a Gulf low quickly riding up along that front and making for a crashing cold and rain-snow mixed Monday (40s for highs) before quickly pulling out Monday night. That's been the gist of it.
Not surprising to see forecast runs flip-flop given the volatility of weather at this big change of seasons, and one of my favored numeric models this morning has Monday warmer and drier...will be interested to see the 06Z runs later this morning to see if others have taken their left leg out or it they're shakin' it all around...that is what it's all about.
Nice thing about this time of year is that really cold temperatures can't hang around too long with the ever increasing sun angle and southerly jet getting stronger. And though there are some forecast lows that flirt with the freezing mark, we don't have the set-up for something like last year's record killing-freeze Easter morning.
Time to hoof it in...and get that &*$# "Hokey-Pokey" song out of my head...
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