SATURDAY: WEAK MICROBURST HIT WEST SPRINGFIELD FRIDAY… SHOWERS THIS MORNING IN NORTHWEST CT AND SOUTHWEST MA, COOLER TEMPS TODAY… WARMER SUNDAY, THEN SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS POSSIBLE MONDAY WITH A COLD FRONTAL PASSAGE… TUES/WED WE DRY OUT, BUT WE MUST NOW WATCH HURRICANE IDA, AS SOME GUIDANCE HAS FLOODING RAINS PUSHING INTO SOUTHERN NEW ENGLAND, ESPECIALLY SOUTH OF THE PIKE FOR THURSDAY… WHETHER IDA RAINS ON US, OR IS SHUNTED SOUTH, TROPICAL STORMS LIKE THAT OFTEN OUR HARBINGERS OF SUMMER-FALL PATTERN CHANGES, AND THIS LOOKS TO BE THE CASE… 7:40AM SAT…

Good morning everybody, to provide full disclosure, I was grocery shopping yesterday, without my reading glasses, just after that storm developed over Northampton (which I saw happen) and when it pushed into Holyoke toward west side.

I was looking at velocity data in the store, and did not notice any microburst pattern, which leads me to believe from that and video footage I’ve seen that this sprang up quickly, and unfortunately knocked down about 30 trees in the West Springfield area, and other towns had some damage too. Below is a link to 22 News’ story posted yesterday, and I’ve attached a couple of damage photos as well. If you have other video footage or photos, please post below in the comments.

https://www.wwlp.com/weather/weather-news/storm-damage-power-outages-in-hampden-county-after-thunderstorm/

While isolated showers and storms were expected, they were mostly expected south and west down near southern Berkshire County and northwest CT. That we got a severe thunderstorm yesterday, albeit isolated, was an outlier result of the air mass in place yesterday.

For today, we have a strong high pressure system dropping south-southeast through Maine, and that is pumping drier, northeast and east-northeast flow from Atlantic Canada into southern New England.

As this flow presses up against more humid, warmer air to our southwest, we are seeing showers, some heavy, and a possible thunder rumble in the southern Berkshires and northwest CT, and these may drift into the western hilltowns, especially south of the Rt. 9 corridor in WMass. Rain may briefly be heavier at times this morning.

So today will see some sunny breaks, but should feature more clouds than sunshine with highs only in the upper 60s to mid 70s and it will feel more comfortable than recent days.

Tonight and tomorrow a warm front to our southwest will lift and track northeast slowly through the region, bringing a few more scattered showers and maybe a thunderstorm this evening and into tomorrow morning as it does so. Lows will be in the upper 50s to low 60s.

For Sunday, morning clouds and showers should give way to brightening skies, though again, more clouds than sun is expected, with perhaps a partly sunny day developing in the afternoon west of the I-91 corridor. Highs will reach the mid 70s to near 80º, and humidity will be on the uptick.

At night, a few showers or a t-storm are possible with lows only in the mid to upper 60s as humidity surges ahead of a cold front that will pass through Monday afternoon/evening.

On Monday, we’re back in the soup, hooray! It’s a good thing, because I’m hungry for MORE SOUP! #Not

We’ll have a mix of clouds and sun, but clouds will build as the day develops, and a cold front presses in from the northwest. Highs will reach the low to mid 80s.

Much drier and cooler air lies behind it, and as it interacts with the warm, humid air in front, a clash will ensue, and with solid instability expected, decent wind shear, and possibly strong lapse rates up into the mid levels, we have to watch for strong to severe thunderstorms in the afternoon and early evening, with pockets of wind damage possible.

After any showers, downpours or storms move through, lows will drop into the low to mid 60s as drier air begins to move into the region by Tuesday, which looks lovely: highs in the upper 70s to low 80s, drier, partial sunshine at least, and full sun possible by afternoon as the front clears south and east. Lows Tuesday night will be in the upper 50s to low 60s.

The Wednesday/Thursday period is the one to watch regarding Hurricane Ida.

This hurricane is going to be brutal and highly damaging for New Orleans and the Louisiana coastline and will be making landfall tomorrow evening, exactly 16 years to the day that Hurricane Katrina made landfall, which is creepy, if you ask me.

It won’t be quite as powerful as Katrina, but it could be very close, possibly coming ashore as a strong Cat 3, or even a low Cat 4 storm with storm surge of 10-15 feet. It’s not looking good down there at all, so whether you pray to a divine power or just send well wishes to people in your mind, do that.

Once Ida does its damage down there, it will recurve north, and northeast and get caught up in the jet stream flow, and will be pushed through Kentucky and northern Tennessee as it dumps rain across its path.

Depending on the timing and interaction with features to its north, it may be shunted south of us, but it’s possible it will bring heavy rainfall to southern New England, especially south of the Rt. 2 corridor in MA down into CT and RI.

This may introduce flash flooding potential for parts of our region, like we need anymore of that.

Over the years I’ve noticed that as we move into September, remnants of tropical systems or actual tropical system that reach our latitude can oftentimes be harbingers of Autumnal pattern changes, acting as the straw-that-broke-the-camel’s-back type of catalyst that pulls drier, cooler, Canadian air building over Canada into and through New England, and at least temporarily (whether Ida rains on us or not), seems to be the case.

Ahh, it’s been a long time since I’ve written a run-on sentence of that length. I’ll go on record and say that was satisfying, hopefully you’re not panting as you drink your coffee now, deep breaths people! Slow in through the nose, slow out through the mouth, that’s better, good job.

Temps from Wednesday through Friday should feature highs in the 70s and lows in the 50s to near 60º, and the outlook for the first half of September is for cooler than average temps overall, so let’s all hope that Ida stays south so we can get a much deserved respite from rains, heat and humidity, oh my!

Have a great day, folks, thanks as always for being here. I’ll continue to try and do my best for you, even when I fall short sometimes.