Here's how the weather will impact watching the total lunar eclipse in Pittsburgh
Any Alert Days Ahead? Either Saturday or Sunday will be a FAWD with strong storms possible late Saturday into Sunday morning.
Aware: Scholars put the date of Christ's crucifixion on Friday April 3, 33 CE based on a lunar eclipse that happened on that same day. Skies should be mostly clear, meaning unimpeded viewing of Friday morning's total lunar eclipse.
It has to be something special, or severe weather on the way, to lead my daily weather blog with the simply outstanding weather on the way. Here we are though, as we will see something that is fairly rare. We don't get to see a total lunar eclipse every year. In fact, the last total lunar eclipse we have seen was Election Day 2022. The next one will land in a year. You can potentially see two a year but that is rare. In 2022, we also saw two total lunar eclipses. When you take away the "total" in front of "lunar eclipse", you can see as many as five lunar eclipses in a single year. While possible, North America has never seen five lunar eclipses in a span of a year. I believe 2019 was the last time we saw five lunar eclipses that occurred in the span of a year.
If you want to see Friday's Lunar eclipse you'll have to be up early. The partial eclipse will begin at 1:09 a.m. with totality starting at 2:26 a.m. Totality will end at 3:31 a.m. with the eclipse ending at 4:47 a.m. During the eclipse, the moon will start by having a shadow cast, and eventually will turn a deep rose color. Unlike solar eclipses, you don't need to wear any special eyewear to view Friday's eclipse. Just sit back and enjoy.
Let's talk about the chances of storms from late Saturday into Sunday. Fast-moving thunderstorms are expected to move through mainly on Sunday morning at this time. The timing of these storms can change, but for now, it appears the peak storm chance will be from around 2 a.m. on Sunday through 6 a.m. Sunday. While they can't completely be ruled out, tornadoes and large hail will also be possible. The chances for either one of those things though will be on the low side.
Finally, let's talk about Thursday's fantastic weather with highs hitting the low 70s and us already in the 60s at noon. Similar to Wednesday, skies will start off partly cloudy before we clear out with mostly sunny afternoon conditions. I have noon temperatures in the low 60s. Winds will be light with some variability at around 5mph. The pleasant weather continues through Saturday, with highs in the mid-70s on both Friday and Saturday.
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