Winter Isn’t Over Yet
It looks like our southern groundhog may have had it wrong earlier this month when he predicted an early spring for Georgia. Looking at the long range forecasts, once we get past this weekend, the first week of March looks a lot more like it should be the first week of February.
Short Term, the threat of thunder moves south of us today, and we’ll have warm weather once the fog burns off later this morning. Tomorrow, colder air approaches from the north as moisture approaches from the south, setting up a wedge situation in our area. Although this is the same type of weather that created our ice storm last month, at this point, at least, it looks like it will be cold rain rather than ice, but things could change.
Seasonable temperatures return for the weekend, with highs in the upper 50s, and lows in the upper 30s.
Then, things begin to go downhill. Monday’s highs are expected to be around 50, with lows below freezing. We’ll stay in this temperature range until at least March 8th. Meanwhile, the low pressure system currently dumping 2 months worth of rain on southern California in two days moves east, and approaches our area late on March 1st. Another wet period expected around the 5th, and a third around the 8th.
Whether any of this turns into frozen precipitation is up in the air. The NCEP ensembles show a 40% probability of snow on March 1st, however the GFS indicates that it will be too warm this far south, and we will get rain instead. The GFS shows it being cold enough on the 8th to produce snow, and a 30% likelihood of precipitation.
Forecasters are pointing out similarities in certain weather features compared to years when early spring snowfalls surprised residents of the Mid Atlantic and the South. As always, we’ll know the weather when it gets here, but I wouldn’t use the flower show next week as your excuse to start planting your annuals and tomatoes quite yet.
Sphere: Related Content