This storm system seems that will blow through the region tomorrow into tomorrow night. Attached below is what accu-weather feels will happen this differs a bit from my forecast. I agree (I did the calculations also) with the NWS however is predicting 3-5" around Pittsburgh and 4-8" in the mountains. I feel that they are more correct this time around.

Today – Increasing cloudiness, High 21.

Tonight – Mostly cloudy becoming cloudy with Snow developing after Midnight. Low 17.

Tomorrow – Snow, heavy at times. High 30. Accumulating 3-5” in the Pittsburgh area, 4- 8” in the Laurels.

Tomorrow night – Snow tapering to flurries, decreasing cloudiness. Low 15.

Let it snow one last time this season!!! Enjoy it.

The weekend (and Spring Break) are shaping up nice I will have more on that later tonight or tomorrow!!

Three Day forecast

The main two words for this forecast will be COLD and SNOW Over the next two days, Monday and Tuesday we will see windchill values close to or below zero. And then overnight Tuesday into Wednesday we will see a chance of some accumulating snowfall over the region, when a clipper system passes our region.

Today – Cloudy, Snow showers likely, little accumulation. Windy. Winds west 20 – 25. High 30.

Tonight – Scattered snow showers, becoming partly cloudy. Windy. Winds Northwest 15 – 30. Low 10. Windchill values 5 to - 15.

Tomorrow - Partly Cloudy. Windy. Winds North 10 – 15. High 22, Windchill values 5 to - 10.

Tomorrow Night – Increasing cloudiness, snow developing after midnight. Low 18.

Wednesday – Snow Likely. Cloudy. High 30.

Wednesday Night – Snow tapering to flurries. Low 16. Total system accumation 2-4" around the area higher in the Mountains and to the North.

Below I have attached the most recent predicated accumulation forecast from Accu-weather.

Early week

First few days of March

First i want to say sorry I already broke my own rule now, I have been working on a Play for New Kensington Civic Theater, and we were moving it to Penn Ken and have been working on that the lighting so I must say a general sorry. But anyhow weather early next week around here should be fine along with most of the nation. We will probably see a chance of Precipitation Today into Monday but it will exit the region by late Monday Night.

Today - Cloudy, chance of scattered snow showers, windy. Winds west 15 - 20 gusts to 35. High 32.

Tonight - Cloudy, chance of a snow shower early, then becoming Partly cloudy. Windy. Winds west 10 -15 gusts to 30. Low 19

Monday - Partly Cloudy, chance of a snow shower early, then a chance of a rain shower, High 37.

Monday Night - Partly Cloudy, chance of snow shower early. Low 17

Tuesday - Partly Cloudy, High 30.

Tuesday Night - Partly Cloudy, Low 19.

Local Weather Update 4 pm

4 pm and no rain yet, it will be coming I swear. The heaviest period of showers and rain will be later the afternoon and this evening when I think we will see a possible thunderstorm which will contain very heavy rainfall and some strong winds. The tempertures are in the 40 north of the city and in the 50's south of the city, which means a large amount of the snowfall that we had two weeks ago is melting quickly. This means that the flooding potential is increased. Now with the rainfall that we will see tonight over .5 to 1"+ of rainfall fall with the 1-2" of liquid from the snowfall we are in for some flooding. Especailly on the Ohio at Pittsburgh. The normal places will see the flooding.

From the NWS here in Pittsburgh's Flooding Advisory,
SNOWMELT IN THE HEADWATERS OF THE ALLEGHENY AND MONONGAHELA RIVERBASINS WILL COMBINE WITH OVERNIGHT RAIN TO PRODUCE SIGNIFICANT RISESON LOCAL RIVERS. WATER MAY REACH THE MONONGAHELA PARKING WHARF AS EARLY AS FRIDAY MORNING.

I will update later as this develops.

National Outlook

It's 3 pm where in the middle of the afternoon just the right time for severe weather to begin to fire up. And a few have just started to fire up, I just looked one the weather channel and heard that a severe tornadoes blew through a school in Enterprise, Alabama. The SPC called this storm many hours ago (8:30 am est) Below is the Watch box for the area produced earlier in the day.

Source: http://www.spc.noaa.gov/products/watch/ww0044.html

This is following Particularly Dangerous Situation (PDS) was issued md 238 at 11:48 which stated this supercell (storm system which can produces tornadoes) is very powerful and strong to severe tornadoes could be could go from Alabama to Georgia.

Lets take a look at how big the storm system is, attached is the Enhanced Infrared satellite image. The area we are talking about is should clearly with the coldest clouds tops the red over Alabama. This system stretches from Neb to the east coast from New York to Florida.

This situation will only continue today into tonight, the most active time for tornado development is during the late afternoon into the evening. I wouldn't be surprised if this tornado outbreak becomes even larger into the evening. The atmosphere down south is very unstable and the ingredients are right for severe weather development very quickly.

Below is the outlook for today from the SPC:

NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER NORMAN OK 1108 AM CST THU MAR 01 2007 ...

A MAJOR SEVERE WEATHER OUTBREAK IS LIKELY ACROSS THE LOWER OHIO VALLEY...LOWER AND MID MISSISSIPPI VALLEY...EASTWARD ACROSS THE GULF AND SOUTH ATLANTIC COASTAL STATES. THE NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER IN NORMAN OK IS ALSO FORECASTING THE DEVELOPMENT OF A TORNADOES...SOME WHICH MAY BE STRONG AND LONG TRACKED...ESPECIALLY ACROSS EASTERN MISSISSIPPI...ALABAMA...AND CENTRAL AND SOUTHERN GEORGIA. THIS AREA IS IN A HIGH RISK FOR SEVERE WEATHER. THE AREAS MOST LIKELY TO EXPERIENCE THIS ACTIVITY INCLUDE ALABAMA CENTRAL AND SOUTHERN GEORGIA EASTERN MISSISSIPPI SURROUNDING THE HIGH RISK AREA...THERE IS A MODERATE RISK OF SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS ACROSS MUCH OF THE LOWER HALF OF THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY AND GULF/SOUTH ATLANTIC COASTAL STATES.

A POWERFUL UPPER LEVEL SYSTEM WILL TRANSLATE EASTWARD FROM THE MID MISSISSIPPI VALLEY INTO THE EASTERN PORTIONS OF THE COUNTRY THIS AFTERNOON AND TONIGHT. A COLD FRONT WILL ACCOMPANY THIS SYSTEM...ALONG WITH VERY STRONG JET LEVEL WINDS. AT THE SAME TIME...STRENGTHENING SOUTHERLY WINDS ARE RAPIDLY TRANSPORTING MOISTURE NORTHWARD AHEAD OF THE FRONT.

SEVERE STORMS ARE ALREADY ONGOING THIS MORNING ACROSS PORTIONS OF THE MISSISSIPPI AND TENNESSEE VALLEYS...AND WITH DAYTIME HEATING...THE COVERAGE OF SEVERE STORMS ARE EXPECTED TO INCREASE. THE MOST INTENSE STORMS ARE EXPECTED THIS AFTERNOON AND EVENING FROM EASTERN MISSISSIPPI ACROSS ALABAMA INTO GEORGIA. THESE STORMS WILL BE IN A VERY FAVORABLE ENVIRONMENT STORMS TO ROTATE AND SPAWN LONG TRACKED...DAMAGING TORNADOES. STRONG TORNADOES ARE ALSO POSSIBLE LATER TODAY ACROSS PORTIONS OF TENNESSEE....WHILE WIDESPREAD WIND DAMAGE AND ISOLATED TORNADOES ARE LIKELY ACROSS MUCH OF THE LOWER OHIO VALLEY. THE SEVERE STORM THREAT WILL PROGRESS EASTWARD TOWARD THE MIDDLE AND SOUTHERN ATLANTIC COAST LATER TONIGHT WITH POTENTIAL FOR DAMAGING WIND GUSTS AND ISOLATED TORNADOES. THIS IS POTENTIALLY A VERY DANGEROUS SITUATION.

THOSE IN THE THREATENED AREA ARE URGED TO REVIEW SEVERE WEATHER SAFETY RULES AND TO LISTEN TO RADIO...TELEVISION...AND NOAA WEATHER RADIO FOR POSSIBLE WATCHES...WARNINGS...AND STATEMENTS LATER TODAY. ..WEISS/HALES.. 03/01/2007

Marching in like a LION!!

Well this is the first 3 hours of march and it marching in like a lion who has eaten in a few day and is anger. This storm system is anticipated to have a major Severe weather outbreak tomorrow. The Storms Predication center doesn't issue this type of map without a very strong feeling that something big will happen over the next 24 hours.

A very high potential for severe weather exist within the Purple circle, a moderate in the red and slight chance in the green. Now don't be fooled with this map pretty much anywhere inside of the brown area could easily see some severe weather. I think around here we stand a good chance for a strong thunderstorm tonight.

If we get a Strong thunderstorm tonight we could be looking at more rainfall which is not good for the streams and rivers. The major concern is flooding and because of the amount of ice on the rivers we could see ice jam flooding where the ice breaks apart but literally jams(dams) up in a location and then after building enough water behind the jam it breaks allowing the water to rush downstream. The last noticeable case of this that occurred in the Pittsburgh area in 1996 when after the ice on the Oil City creek decided to jam and held for a significant period of time, holding back massive amounts of water. Then almost around the 6 pm news it let loose. Which meant flooding downriver in a few hours. This could happen again the different between that snow melt/rain event is that that one had temps that reached into the 60's and very dense fog developed over the Laurels which is a snow killer (eats snow rapidly), today we are only predicted to reach into the mid 50's.

As the weather develops I will update.

2/28 - 3/4

Before we read the five day forecast, a bit of history on today. Two years ago back in 2005 we had a nice size snowstorm fire up over the mid Atlantic. This storm system produced over 7 inches of snowfall in the Pittsburgh area (Pittsburgh International received 7, downtown however got a little less)but the four PSU campuses in Pittsburgh only two hour delayed. Yeah so it was tough traveling conditions to campus that day. But now the five day:

Today – Partly cloudy, High 41.

Tonight – Increasing Cloudiness, chance of showers toward daybreak, Low 32.

Tomorrow – Rain, heavy at times, cloudy, High 52.

Tomorrow Night – Rain and Showers around, cloudy, Low 38.

Friday – Cloudy a chance of rain, High 45.

Friday Night – Cloudy, a chance of a shower, Low 28.

Saturday – Cloudy, a chance of a shower or flurries, High 37.

Saturday Night – Cloudy, a chance of flurries, Low 22.

Sunday – Cloudy, a chance of flurries, High 32.

Sunday Night – Cloudy, a chance of flurries, Low 22.

Note: A chance of Flooding is beginning to show up on a few model sites for tomorrow night into Friday because of the rapid snow melting and the amount of rain we are expected to receive tomorrow into Friday. I will probably post a little bit later as more is understood about this situation.