Wednesday evening video forecast

The threat for severe weather and heavy rain has ended. It will start feeling more like December as much cooler temperatures return to the Capital Area.

Next 24 Hours: A cold front will continue marching east through the area overnight. Skies will gradually clear from west to east. As winds shift to the northwest at 10-15mph, temperatures will dip with lows ending up in the mid 40s. Thursday will feel like an entirely different season. Despite plenty of sunshine, it will feel cool and dry with afternoon highs in the low 60s. There will be a north breeze of 5-10mph.

Up Next: Low temperatures will return to the upper 30s on Friday morning. It will be a sunny and cool finish to the workweek with high temperatures in the upper 50s. Saturday and Sunday will be partly sunny with highs in the upper 50s and lows in the upper 30s. There in one little hiccup in the forecast as there is at least a small chance that some showers could end up developing on Saturday. That will become clearer over the next day or so. Either way, the weekend will have lots of dry time. An area of low pressure will move across the Gulf of Mexico Monday into Tuesday delivering a period of rain to the central Gulf Coast. Temperatures are expected to stay at or below average through the 7-Day Forecast. In fact, long term guidance gives us increasing confidence that below average temperatures and cool weather will be lasting into the holiday. CLICK HERE for your detailed 7-Day Forecast.

The Explanation: As a cold front continues to press eastward, an upper level trough of low pressure will build into the Southern U.S. and maintain cooler than average temperatures for the remainder of the workweek. At this time, it appears as though temperatures will be remaining above freezing despite dipping into the upper 30s Thursday through Saturday nights. After the weekend, an upper level disturbance spinning through the base of the upper level trough will move across Texas causing a surface low pressure system to form along the coast. This low will track from west to east across the Gulf of Mexico leading to a shield of stratiform form moving inland up to the I-12 corridor. This will be a cool rain, that keep the area well north of the unstable, stormy warm sector and so this appears to be just a nuisance event.

The weather story now moves on to a return of winter. As we've been saying, this cool air will have staying power, likely through the holiday. In addition to the @NWSCPC Outlook, model guidance looks cold around #Christmas.

Date: Highs/Lows
12-24: 40s/20s
12-25: 40s/30s pic.twitter.com/gR5xrDfpS8
— Josh Eachus (@DrJoshWX) December 14, 2022

The trough is expected to deepen with reinforcing troughs driving more cold fronts through the area a couple of times before Christmas. The long term outlook via the Climate Prediction Center gives good chances to temperatures being below average, and perhaps well below average, for the holiday.

--Josh

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