WEATHER BLOG: Changes Coming

Toward the coast it looks to stay cloudy all afternoon. Finally a nice day Friday before some big changes over the weekend.

There was some dense fog in the mid-Atlantic region again Thursday morning, as well as spotty drizzle. As the latest front pushes from west to east across the region during the next 12 hours, these showers will pivot northeastward along the I-95 corridor. And, in addition to the morning fog and a couple of showers, there will even be a thunderstorm in a couple of spots. Most temperatures will be within a couple of degrees of 80. The temperature Friday should reach the lower 80s, and there will be lots of sunshine. The consensus now for Saturday (after a series of tweaks back and forth regarding temperatures and timing) is that our next cold front, which will reaching the East Coast later in the afternoon.

This front, which will be much more potent than its predecessor Thursday, is going to unleash the season's coolest air mass thus far on the Northeast and the mid-Atlantic states Saturday night and Sunday.

We've settled on a forecast for Saturday of sun followed by increasing clouds, and temperatures in the middle 70s. But there should be a few widely separated showers around, and perhaps even a thunderstorm later in the afternoon and at night. That next cold front is going to have a wave of low pressure developing along it late Saturday and Saturday night, which should usher a shield of steadier rain into the area either late on Saturday night or early Sunday morning.

We continue to feel very confident about the much cooler scenario setting up for Sunday, when temperatures will fail to get out of the mid or upper 50s. Add at least a few hours of rain to this, and you almost come up with the POLAR OPPOSITE of what we're expecting Friday. So, for those who have weekend plans, Saturday should be the better of the two days for outdoor activities -- because even if there is a shower or two, it will be holding off until some time later in the afternoon, and temperatures will be some 10 or 15 degrees higher than what we're expecting Sunday.