Cooler temperatures in place today for the first day of fall in the Pittsburgh area
Cooler temperatures will be in place today for the first day of fall in the Pittsburgh area.
Aware: Monongahela River at Grays Landing is forecast to hit its Action Stage tonight, remaining slightly high through Thursday morning.
The flash flood risk is over for the week, but rivers and streams continue to slowly rise as water makes its way through our area basins to the Monongahela, Allegheny, and eventually the Ohio River. At this point, only one reporting area, the Monongahela at Grays Landing is expected to hit the 'action stage' locally. Most flooding is occurring southwest of us in parts of West Virginia. A flood watch remains in place from Allegheny County to the south through 8 a.m. on Wednesday due to potentially swollen rivers and especially small streams. Please turn around if you see water on roads. Do not try to go through.
While our flash flood risk is over, we will see some light rain and drizzle through the day today. Skies will remain overcast with breezy winds coming in from the northeast. Keep the umbrella handy. Highs today will be near 60 degrees with no big warm-up. Morning temperatures bottomed out in the mid-50s, and that's where we will stay through around 10 a.m. with temperatures then slowly ticking up to near 60° by 3 p.m. I imagine there will be somewhere that sees more than 0.75" of fairly continuous rain, with everyone else seeing less than a half inch of additional rain occurring off and on through the day.
The Autumnal Equinox occurs tonight at 8:05 p.m. The Autumnal Equinox is one of two equinoxes we see every year where the sun makes a perfect 90° angle with the Earth's equator. For the 12 hours before and after the equinox time, people living on the equator will see a perfect 12 hours of daylight and nighttime. Our 'equal' day occurs later this week. Our sunrise is at 7:08 a.m., with our sunset happening at 7:18 p.m.
Back to your forecast, rain chances come to an end sometime overnight. Stratiform rain showers, what we will be seeing today, are always tough to get an exact time they will end. It isn't like a cold front where we know pretty exactly where the line will be. It looks like showers will end by 7 a.m. Wednesday morning. Wednesday highs will be in the low 60s with sunshine returning for the afternoon. Morning temperatures on Wednesday will dip to the low 50s.
Looking ahead, a nice dry stretch will continue through the weekend. I have Thursday and Friday highs in the mid-60s, with highs near 70 on Saturday and Sunday.
