Wednesday Thoughts

Tuesday, 2PM

Tomorrow could be a very busy day for the National Weather Service across the Mid-Atlantic, especially in the late afternoon and evening. The remnants of Ida will converge with a stalled front potentially bringing heavy rain across the area, and the possibility of severe storms with tornadoes during the afternoon.

The models have shifted the center of what remains of Ida more north, which makes for good and bad news. For those looking to avoid the long duration heavy rain and extreme flash flooding, the good news is that the heaviest axis of rain tomorrow should be near and north of the MD/PA border. However, the more north track means that Ida’s center will pass to our west and north, putting us squarely in the southeastern quadrant of the storm. The bad news is that this quadrant is where the most severe storms develop. So, even though Ida has been downgraded to a tropical depression, there could be super-cell storms containing potentially large tornadoes crossing the area tomorrow afternoon and evening. It is not a definite, but it’s worth noting that although any tornado in a densely populated areas is dangerous, some of the tornadoes tomorrow could be larger than the small spin-up type that we get more frequently. My point is that if any tornado watches or warnings are issued tomorrow, take them seriously.

For now, models suggest a round of rain will develop before sunrise tomorrow and end across most of the area during the morning. Then there may be some clearing around midday which will only serve to prime the atmosphere for any severe storms later in the day. Also, it should be mentioned that although we will probably not be getting the 4 to 6″ of rain that was being advertised yesterday, any thunderstorm could produce extremely heavy downpours that can quickly bring localized, short term flash-flooding. Much of the area is well above normal with regards to rainfall so local flooding is still possible.

I’ll try to update Wednesday morning.