Tuesday, April 21, 2015

warm sun and thunder... (pm.21.apr.15)>

Tuesday's stats:

Low temp: 59.5F (15.3C)
High temp: 80.2F (26.8C)
Rainfall: 0.09" (2mm) -- updated @ 8:20pm

It is partly cloudy this evening as the sun goes down, though we still have a couple of towering cumulus clouds visible -- leftovers of the thundershower which moved through the area early this evening.  The day was full of hazy sunshine until the mountain clouds billowed during the mid-afternoon, which led to the first rumbles of thunder just after 3:30pm.  There was a period of light to moderate showers between roughly 5:00 and 5:30pm, but then it cleared out quickly, leaving us with this pleasantness at sunset.  I'll update the rainfall amount (above) later this evening.

Today's high just above 80ºF was a bit warmer than expected, and the second day in a row we've cracked that barrier.  Interesting how we've gone from well below normal temperatures to well above -- in only about 4-5 days.  We've definitely crossed the line into summertime weather dynamics, with warmer air at the surface interacting with lingering cooler air aloft -- leading to sunny and warm days with isolated mountain thunder development during the PM hours.  It's going to remain a bit unstable during the afternoon/early evening hours all the way into the weekend, so don't be surprised by some random thundershowers after about 3pm on any given day.  Still, there should be plenty of sunshine to enjoy otherwise.

I've been underforecasting high temperatures almost every day lately... due to my paranoia about cloud development which would put a damper on the warming of this late April atmosphere.  But it seems that we remain in line for temperatures near or perhaps just slightly above normal throughout the next five days at least.  Of course it never pays to get overconfident about anything more than a day or two in advance around here, though.

Details can be found on THE 7-DAY OUTLOOK tab above.