Short Range Forecast Discussion NWS Weather Prediction Center College Park MD 510 AM EDT Fri Apr 03 2015 Valid 12Z Fri Apr 03 2015 - 12Z Sun Apr 05 2015 ...Heavy rains and strong to severe thunderstorms will be possible across the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys on Friday... ...Accumulating snowfall expected in northern New England by the weekend... A persistent supply of moisture streaming northward out of the Gulf of Mexico will set the stage for active weather over the Eastern half of the Nation late this week. Heavy rains and strong to severe thunderstorms will continue to focus along a frontal boundary stretched through the Ohio Valley early Friday...and as a surface low along the boundary deepens and tracks eastward...it will bring additional rounds of heavy rains and increased risk for flash flooding to portions of the Ohio Valley. Friday night into Saturday...the strengthening surface low should track through the northern Mid-Atlantic states and into the Northeast. Late season accumulating snows will be possible within the back edge of precipitation developing over New England...and the threat for heavy rains and severe storms will continue with the trailing cold front pushing through the Tennessee Valley. The surface low...cold front...and any associated precipitation should push off the East coast by Saturday evening. The tail end of the cold front clearing the Eastern Seaboard will stall out over the western Gulf. The lingering frontal boundary should bring some scattered showers and thunderstorms into Texas this weekend. Out West...a weakening frontal boundary approaching the coast will bring rain and higher elevation snow from the Pacific Northwest to the northern Rockies late Friday into Saturday. Gerhardt Graphics available at www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/basicwx/basicwx_wbg.php