Kevin Myatt

Latest entries from the Weather Journal blog

• Weather Journal taking a long break
• Yes, there's still an Atlantic tropical season going on
• Freezing temperatures likely tonight

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.

Weather systems will bring no joy for snow or sun lovers

You've heard the football expression that a tie is like kissing your sister.

Well, the battle of atmospheric patterns over the Atlantic and Pacific oceans that I wrote about last week has, more or less, played to a tie.

The blocking high pressure over Greenland, which could help set up a wintry pattern, and the strong low over the northern Pacific just south of Alaska, which has swept in milder air, have canceled each other out.

The result has been somewhat colder weather, and even a wet storm system over the last couple of days that brought lots of rain to Southwest Virginia and a little ice to higher elevations, but no real winter storms.

Losing the strong low in the northern Pacific is going to allow high pressure to build near the West Coast, and this will push even colder weather our way next week. There could be one or two very cold days ahead.

But, with the high pressure over Greenland also diminishing, the pattern may look a lot like late November and early December, when several cold fronts pushed through, but it stayed mostly dry. Cold air masses would stay a day or two before slipping away.

Any snow threat the next week to 10 days will depend on relatively weak, hard-to-time disturbances zipping in from the west, or Alberta clippers diving in from the northwest.

Pucker up, snow lovers and sun seekers. The weather pattern is not great for either of you.