A Cornucopia of Weather for Thanksgiving Week for Eastern NY State

Interesting possibilities in our weather for next week especially as we gear up for the Thanksgiving Holiday period along with all the travel that goes along with this time of year.

(Note of advice: When a weatherman or meteorologist uses "interesting" with an upcoming forecast it could mean not "so" good weather is heading our way).

A very active jetstream across the Western US this weekend will give rise to bouts of stormy weather across the country as we head towards the holiday period. Initially the worst weather will be across the Rockies and Plains States this weekend through Monday then these areas will likely see a turn to much colder air. As a matter of fact the first incursion of Arctic air will spill down across the Rockies and Northern Plains by late Monday through Wednesday.

As this arctic air plunges south and southeastwards early next week the active storm pattern and cold will begin to shift east towards the Eastern US by Wednesday through Thanksgiving Day (TGD). The cold front will advance east and reach the Eastern Great Lakes  and Ohio Valley on Tuesday. Ahead of this cold front mild air and clouds will start off the week for Eastern Upstate New York. There could be some showers on both Monday and Tuesday (especially on Tuesday) as the cold front gets closer and moves through.

This cold front is expected to move off the Northeast coast by late Tuesday/early Wednesday with colder air filtering in behind. The front is also forecast to stall during Wednesday along a line from the offshore waters of the Mid-Atlantic States across Southern Virginia to northern Texas. It is along this front that a series of low pressure systems will form and move east-northeast to northeast across the Eastern Great Lakes or perhaps New England.

For Wednesday, the "big" travel day before the holiday, most of the day now looks like it will be colder and mostly cloudy but dry. By Wednesday late afternoon/evening time it looks like the first wave of low pressure will be moving to southwest PA and this could spread an initial period of light precipitation across the Southern Tier of NY to Albany. With colder air over these locations this precipitation could very well be a wintry mix of sleet and snow perhaps even some pockets of freezing rain. This precipitation could last into early TGD morning, perhaps even nudging north by then into the Mohawk Valley, Adirondacks and Lake George regions where it could fall as a light snow.

A second more potent low pressure system is then forecast to follow this initial one during the TGD and track across the Eastern Great Lakes. This second low will result in a steadier precipitation to overspread all of interior NY State during the holiday. Initially it could be of a wintry variety but with a low track across Western New NY State a change to rain should occur.

However, if a secondary area of low pressure develops along the Delmarva Peninsula (and this is a very distinct possibility) then colder air could remain locked in along and north of the Mohawk Valley-Albany-Southern Vermont line, keeping the precipitation either a wintry mix or perhaps even all snow!

Our weather prediction computer models are offering a variety of possibilities and scenarios to the holiday period weather. So all that I can say as of right now, I'll be updating this this blog  so make sure to follow it as well as your local weather forecasts, too. We should be able to get a better grip on what will happen as we get closer to the event.

Another thing to watch out for over the TGD weekend is the potential for the seasons first significant "lake-effect" snows to develop downwind of  Lakes Erie and Ontario. I believe the potential is there for some locally very heavy snow to fall across the "favored" snowbelts of NY State. This will likely be the subject of another blog update later in the week.