Wednesday is shaping up to be a day of unsettled weather with several opportunities for rain and thunderstorms throughout the day. Some of tomorrow’s late-day storms could be strong or even severe, but there are plenty of uncertainties regarding the severe potential as of Tuesday morning.
Things will kick off early Wednesday as low pressure across the lower Great Lakes region tracks to Ontario and lifts a warm front across eastern Ohio. Scattered rain showers are a pretty good bet during the morning and maybe early afternoon. The morning model runs do show some instability during the morning hours, which may be enough to spark a few non-severe embedded thunderstorms.
The main window for severe thunderstorms in our area is expected to develop during the late afternoon and evening hours as a strong cold front approaches from the northwest.
The atmosphere overhead will be primed with the necessary ingredients for organized thunderstorms to develop – warm temperatures in the low to mid-70s, elevated dewpoints in the low to mid-60s, sufficient instability, and upper-level shear. These could support thunderstorms capable of producing damaging wind gusts, isolated tornadoes, and, to a lesser degree, hail.
The NWS Storm Prediction Center has maintained the Level 2 – Slight Risk – category for a large chunk of Ohio for severe storms on Wednesday. The SPC also included a 5% – 9% hatched tornado threat in our area.
What is uncertain at this stage is how much of an impact the early-morning rain and cloudiness will have on instability late in the day as the cold front approaches. More overcast sky conditions and a greater spread of rain showers earlier in the day may favor less destabilization during the latter part of the day.
AFTER THE STORM
The cold front should cross our area on Wednesday night, and a much colder air mass will rush into the region. Thursday’s high temperature will run about 30° colder than Wednesday’s. Northwesterly winds will increase with gusts of 30-35 mph possible. Any lingering precipitation will become a mix of rain and snow, briefly changing to all snow. Warm ground temperatures should limit snow accumulation in the area to maybe a coating on grassy areas.
A clipper system is due to cross the Great Lakes region on Friday, returning rain/snow chances to the Valley. The bigger impact, however, may come from an increase in wind gusts with models indicating the potential of 40+ mph gusts in our area.
We will, of course, keep you updated here as the situation develops over the next 24 hours. We do expect an update from the Storm Prediction Center later this afternoon that may include an upgrade to Wednesday’s severe potential that might include parts of Ohio.
