Good morning! I hope everyone enjoyed the July 4th weekend and glad to see it wasn’t a total washout with the back half certainly better. After record setting high temps a few days earlier, the Northeast broke records for the lowest daytime high temps for July in a number of locations. Mother Nature hasn’t been too kind on back to back Holidays. Lets see how Labor Day weekend turns out, not that I’m rushing the summer away, well…..Ok, two items to discuss this morning. First, the timing on today’s 2nd round of storms (yesterday afternoon was doozy with thousands without power and plenty of down trees) which breaks day 2 of heat, and second, details on Tropical Storm Elsa. It’s certainly an active weather pattern with plenty of elements to stir things up (as a football and weather nut, I always got a kick out of Bill Parcells referring to active weather, usually the bitter cold, snow and windswept rainstorms, as the “elements”, and how they’re a “tremendous equalizer”).
Today’s Storms Which Knockdown the Heat
Unfortunately, we have another scorcher on our hands today as the mercury climbs into low to mid 90s across the tri-state area (upper 90s in DC), upper 80s in Southern New England, cooler at the beaches. Of course, the high dewpoints will create oppressive conditions. While the line of storms coming later today won’t wash away the humidity as we have SW winds blowing ahead of Elsa’s arrival, temps will drop to normal levels Thursday and below normal over the weekend into early next week. As far as timing on today’s front moving through the Northeast, and similar to yesterday expect cells to fire up late afternoon into the evening hours. For the moment, it appears there’s more instability from CNJ on north this go around, leaving the Balt/DC and SNJ quiet on the storm front. I can’t rule out isolated pop-ups though. The outlook for Thursday will be mostly cloudy, mild and sticky with temps in the low to mid 80s (mid to low 70s across the Cape, VT NH and ME). Rain does make its way into the tri-state later in the day as conditions deteriorate from SW to NE on Elsa’s quick visit up the coast (See 10 day temperature forecasts for Northeast cities below).
Elsa, I95 Special
First mentioned on my post last Wednesday as one that we need to keep an eye on, Elsa jumped on a Tesla and accelerated rapidly across the southern Atlantic through the Caribbean up to the west coast of Florida. Fortunately, its forward speed, among other obstacles prevented Elsa from becoming a larger more potent cyclone. As of 5am the latest observations show winds of 65mph, minimum pressure of 1004mb, moving N at 14mph. Its currently located 50 miles SSW of Cedar Key, Florida.
Its latest track takes Elsa through N Florida (later this morning) up to SE GA (tonight) and jumps on I95. Its tropical storm characteristics remain even though its path keeps it inland from Columbia, SC (Thursday morning) to Raleigh, NC (Thursday afternoon) on up to the Chesapeake Bay (late Thursday evening/ early Friday morning) where it moves offshore and gains strength off the NJ coast. While back over the above normal sea surface temperatures, winds will strengthen and take Elsa NE to Montauk, Chilmark to Chatham and eventually to the chilly waters of the Gulf of Maine. While Elsa will be flying up the coast (exiting the coast of Maine by Friday night), the main culprits will be flooding downpours (scattered flash flooding possible), gusty conditions with tropical storm force winds and an isolated tornado threat up the Eastern Seaboard. Flood Watches and High Wind Advisories I’m sure will be posted in the coming days.
Key takeaways are the following. This is NOT Sandy or a major Hurricane. While there will more than likely be isolated wind damage, power outages and flooding in the prone areas, Elsa won’t be sticking around long in any one area. We are talking 3-6 hours tops of maximum impact time. Total rainfall amounts will vary up the coast but 1-3” locally higher is expected. Wind gusts between 40-60mph with potentially higher gusts are possible along coastal sections of NJ, Long Island, especially eastern sections, SE CT, RI, and the Cape.
That’s it for now. I will circle back probably over the next 24 hours on any changes to my comments above. Remember its only July and usually a quiet month for the tropics, which will be shut down for a few weeks. As mentioned I do expect an active Hurricane season for the East Coast, with the Northeast in the crosshairs, which is overdue. In another post, I’ll share the major Hurricanes that have hit the Northeast, a number of which go back many many decades and some were more powerful than current cyclones. That is NOT a reason alone to suspect activity but along with warmer than normal sea surface temperatures, among other historical elements, its never too early to prepare. Stay tuned, as I have plenty to share and look forward to keeping everyone updated through out the summer and into the fall. Stay cool today folks and remember, weather never sleeps!
Notes aside: check out this cool video I took at the Jersey shore of crepuscular rays from the sun connecting with rare anti-crepuscular rays, which are opposite the sun.