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Latest entries from the Weather Journal blog
About Kevin
Kevin Myatt grew up in Arkansas to the tune of tornado sirens and the rhythm of hailstones, aspiring to be a meteorologist before his studies and career were turned to journalism instead. Though he often chases storms, he prefers living in the cooler, more tranquil weather of the Blue Ridge. He moved to Roanoke in 1999 to take a job on the copy desk of The Roanoke Times; writing headlines and editing copy is his principal work for the newspaper today.
Each May, Kevin assists Pulaski County High School / Virginia Tech meteorology instructor Dave Carroll in leading college and high school students to the Plains to observe severe weather firsthand. The accounts of many of his storm chases can be found here on the storm chasing page of his weather blog on roanoke.com.
Kevin was an editor for "Hurricanes and the Middle Atlantic States," a book written by D.C.-area weather enthusiast Rick Schwartz and published by Blue Diamond Books that documents hurricanes striking the mid-Atlantic states since colonial times.
The Weather Journal column began in 2003 and appears on Friday's Virginia section front in The Roanoke Times. The Weather Journal blog began in 2006 and follows weather day-by-day between the larger columns.
Warm weather could bring rain
By Kevin Myatt
The Roanoke Times
If you're tired of the cold, or you like snow and you're tired of a cold weather pattern that hasn't delivered much snow, you're about to get a much-desired pattern reset next week.
After another cold day that might have just a few scattered snow showers with a weak disturbance, a warm-up is going to start that will last at least until midweek.
A new weather pattern will take hold with the jet stream guiding the next couple of storm systems into the Ohio Valley and Great Lakes. Each of these storms will sweep warm, moist air into our region. We could push above 60 a couple of days this coming week.
While all the warmth lovers will rejoice after so many cold days, snow lovers have some reason for hope.
The current pattern, while bringing lots of cold weather, isn't going to deliver much more in the way of snow. Sometimes you have to tear down the house to rebuild it.
The weather pattern will be in transition the next several days and could be volatile. What it settles into after the next seven to 10 days will, I believe, determine how winter 2007-08 is remembered. There are conflicting signals about what that will look like.
I suspect that we will have at least one more one- to two-week period of cold, probably in mid- to late February. If the overall weather pattern across the U.S. continues to be volatile, there could be a winter storm or two for us in that. We'll just have to wait and see how it plays out.
There is no such winter storm on the horizon for us now. Late next week, however, will have to be watched. Some moisture, ahead of a new storm system, may find its way into a brief renewal of cold air that will follow the system bringing warm rain at midweek.
January ends Thursday. After a warm start, the month is almost back to normal in its average temperature after several days of chill. It appears likely that next week's warmth will be enough to make it our fourth January in a row at least 2 degrees above normal.
The midweek potential for rain gives us a shot at overcoming the 112-inch precipitation deficit we have for the month as of Thursday. Considering that 18 of the past 23 months have been at least half an inch below normal, it's not going to alleviate the long-term drought, but it would get the year off to a decent start in rainfall.
Our biggest "rain" so far in 2008 was actually the melted snow and ice on Jan. 17. About 4 inches of snow and the layer of sleet and glaze ice on top melted down to six-tenths of an inch of liquid.
We can certainly use the precipitation that a more unsettled pattern would bring.
And whether you like warmth or snow, restoring moisture into the ground is still our most critical need for 2008. Either repeated rains in a mild pattern or repeated snows in a cold pattern would help with that.
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