Good Sunday, everyone. Saturday’s weather was every bit as wild as we thought it would be. We went from the 60s to snow showers in a matter of hours as winds flirted with 50mph in a few spots. Our weekend is wrapping up cold, but what about the turkey week ahead?

Let’s start with today before we jump go all gobble gobble on you. Get it? Gobble… never mind. 🙂

Leftover snow showers and flurries may be around to start the day across the east and southeast…

These won’t show up on radar very well, but some flakes may be flying out there early. Winds will still be a bit gusty with afternoon highs only in the 30s.

Monday starts cold with upper teens in the valleys and 20-25 everywhere else. Sunny skies will boost temps into the 40s.

The dry weather should carry us through the busy travel day Wednesday. Clouds increase Thanksgiving Day as a storm system approaches from the west. Winds become southwesterly during this time as temps rise. Heavy rain and some thunder pushes in for Black Friday. The models continue to handle this complex system differently from run to run. The latest GFS shows a lot of rain followed by much colder air and some flakes by late Saturday…

GFS

Notice how it keeps part of the storm to our southwest. That’s because it leaves a lot of the upper air energy bundled up in the southwestern part of the country…

GFS 2

I’m not sold on that happening… not to that extent. The -EPO suggests any trough in the west doesn’t stay there for long. Let’s say that is correct. The model then brings that storm system out a few days later and into our region into early December…

GFS 3

That would unleash some cold air. The same model run shows another trough digging in a few days later…

GFS 4

Another sign pointing at some intrusions of cold air into the east comes from the PNA (Pacific North American pattern). A positive PNA means a ridging up the west coast of the United States that usually leads to downstream trough across the central and east. Notice how the forecast for the PNA goes strongly positive as we flip from November to December…

PNA

Now, check where the PNA has been for most of fall… negative. It’s not a coincidence this fall has been warmer than normal for our region and much of the country.

I will update later today. Take care.