Midday Zones: Summer warmth today, unsettled late week

Happy Easter to this who celebrate! We hope you’re able to enjoy the day with the family, friends, and loved ones who are most important to you. Regardless of whether you celebrate or not, we’re all being treated to summer-like warmth today. A deep west/southwesterly flow became rooted at the low levels of the atmosphere this morning and will continue through the afternoon. This has helped to advect a very warm airmass into the area and this air will remain over the region.

The west/southwesterly wind component to the airmass is probably the most critical (and meteorologically fascinating) aspect to the airmass which settles into the area. You may remember last week, much of the interior experienced warmth very similar to today. Temperatures rose into the lower and middle 80’s on those days as well. But near the coast, the cold ocean waters had their say — marine air shifted inland by 25 miles or so and kept coastal locations (and much of Long Island) very cool compared to their surroundings.

If the ocean has not gotten much warmer (it hasn’t) what’s causing today’s warmth to extend all the way to the coast? Just like it so often is in summer, it’s all about the wind direction! Last week’s warmth a southerly wind component in the lower levels of the atmosphere. This mean that the cold ocean air was able to streak along the NJ Shore and, more notably, across most of Long Island, which is exposed to the ocean to its south.

Today, however, a west-southwest wind component is driving warm air into the region off the warmer, drier land back to our south and west. These days are typically very warm throughout the region. The only days which tend to end up warmer are days in mid-summer when a northwest wind component draws a very warm airmass into the region off completely dry land, but those are even more rare.

Nevertheless, even west-southwesterly wind like today acts to not only draw warm air into the region, but keep ocean effects at bay. The seabreeze and inland movement of cold, ocean air is mitigated overall as the west-southwesterly winds fight the easterly winds of the incoming marine air.

A cold front approaches the region later this afternoon and tonight, and will bring with it the chance for some isolated to scattered thunderstorms. The chances for storms are expected to be relatively inhibited by a lack of support for storm organization. In other words, there is not much lift in the atmosphere to allow the storms to form, and even if they did form there is not much support aloft for storms to become organized.

Still, a few isolated storms may still develop and produce heavy rain and lightning in some areas. We’ll be carefully monitoring through the afternoon and evening for the development for storms that may put a dent in some afternoon or evening plans.

Cooler high pressure will settle into the region during the upcoming week, keeping the weather pleasant and seasonable for the first few days. Unsettled weather gradually will return by the latter half of the week as Pacific disturbances begin approaching from the west. The first approaches on Thursday and may bring showers to the region through the weekend, as a front lingers nearby.

Confidence in individual disturbances and periods of steadier rain currently remains quite low, however — so stay tuned for updates and more detail as we get closer during this week.