Short Range Forecast Discussion
NWS Weather Prediction Center College Park MD
358 AM EDT Mon Oct 16 2023

Valid 12Z Mon Oct 16 2023 - 12Z Wed Oct 18 2023

...A cool autumn air-mass will be slow to depart the eastern half of the
country with scattered showers in parts of the Northeast, Great Lakes, and
Central Appalachians...

...Warm and dry across much of the western U.S. but rainy conditions over
the Pacific Northwest...

...A warming trend expected in the Great Plains as a round of rain reaches
into the northern Plains late Tuesday...

An expansive area of north to northwesterly flow between a departing storm
system off the Canadian Maritimes and a high pressure ridge axis anchored
over the High Plains will continue to direct a dome a cool autumn air mass
farther south toward the Gulf Coast.  One more morning of below freezing
temperatures can be expected over the central High Plains today before the
reservoir of warm air over much of the western U.S begins to slowly filter
into the Great Plains.  The warming process, however, will be slow to
occur as the weather pattern that sustains the massive dome of cool autumn
air over the eastern half of the country takes time to break down.  Under
this weather pattern, scattered showers will once again be found today
from interior New England to the lower Great Lakes, down across the Ohio
Valley, and as farther south as the southern Appalachians.  Even some wet
snow is possible near the peaks of the central and southern Appalachians
through Tuesday morning.  The rain should hold off along the Eastern
Seaboard but partly to occasionally mostly cloudy condition will prevail
today before the high pressure ridge finally slides across the region
later on Tuesday with a better chance of seeing breaks in the clouds.

While much of the interior western U.S. has been dry, moisture associated
with a pair of fronts ahead of an upper trough will bring windy and rainy
conditions into the Pacific Northwest and down into the northwestern
California today.  This latest round of rain is forecast to end later on
Tuesday from Oregon southward but the Olympic Peninsula in Washington will
remain rainy through Wednesday morning with the arrival of a warm front
well ahead of the next Pacific system.  Meanwhile, a piece of the lead
upper trough will penetrate farther inland, bringing a round of rain and
high-elevation wet snow across Idaho and Montana Monday night into early
Tuesday.  By Tuesday night into early Wednesday, an Alberta clipper is
forecast to slide southeastward into the far northern Plains where a round
of rain can be expected.  Southerly flow developing ahead of the Alberta
clipper and a lee trough near the foothills of the Rockies will allow warm
air to filter into the High Plains on Tuesday, resulting in afternoon high
temperatures well into the 80s by Tuesday afternoon with dry conditions
continue.  Meanwhile, above normal temperatures will continue over the
Desert Southwest where high temperatures will top the century mark for the
next few days.

Kong


Graphics available at
https://www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/basicwx/basicwx_ndfd.php