Rainy Saturday To Be Sure

It is now quite evident that today will dawn mostly cloudy and the wx conditions in the central and eastern portions of PA will deteriorate throughout the day.  There will be no way to escape the progressive line of showers and some embedded heavier thundershowers from a trailing cold front that emanates from a deep cyclone over eastern O Canada. First, take a look at the radar returns as seen early this Saturday morning...

Note the yellows embedded within the wider line of rain.  In fact, WPC has become more bullish on a heavier and a wider spread rainfall as noted in their QPF graphic for today...

These heavier showers and storms do have the potential to "train"; that is to move over the same places repeatedly as the entire front advances from W to E.  Also note the connection of this line of rain to the deep tropics.  In addition, the IR pic will also verify this moisture feed as seen below...

On the satellite pic, you can see the deep storm located over Hudson Bay as well as the vast area of cloud free skies over the prairie provinces of Manitoba and Saskatchewan.  I always liked saying that province and its capitol of Saskatoon!  Here is the synoptic map for early Saturday over North America.

That modest double barreled high will strengthen as it ridges SE and be anchored over the eastern part of North America for the bulk of this upcoming week.  The upper air pattern suggests an "Omega Block" as the steering winds aloft represent the Greek letter omega.  Take a look at the 500 mb prog as noted by the Euro ensembles for Tuesday...note the anomalously high pressures over eastern O Canada that will tend to block normal  progression of wx systems across North America for most of next week. So, once we get rid of this rain today, another string of spectacular autumnal wx is in store for these parts for many days to come.

Even as late as next Friday, upper air ridging will be in place keeping any tropical troubles well off to our south and east.  Most modeling suggests the area of disturbed wx presently in the Gulf of Mexico will gradually meander across the northern gulf and eventually spin up into "fish storm" over the central Atlantic as this upcoming week progresses.  Here is the Euro's depiction of the 500 mb level for late next week...

 So, with all of that said, many asked about the short term in my travels yesterday...that is, when will it begin to rain on Saturday?  Here is the most recent run of the HRRR model which frankly does a nice job in near term...it shows the band of rain on the doorstep by 2 pm or so today...

So get out there by noon or so, and I would think you'll be dry.  All bets are off for the anytime afternoon.  But do take time to peruse this post and listen to this unique blues ditty about city rains to our south...sort of...

Enjoy your weekend and the string of pristine wx again next week.

Smitty

AA:  Rain for Saturday afternoon.  Improving conditions Sunday and then a string of some more fall beauties in terms of the wx next week!