127
FXUS61 KRLX 070817
AFDRLX

AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
National Weather Service Charleston WV
317 AM EST Thu Nov 7 2024

.SYNOPSIS...
Slow moving cold front crosses today with rain showers and
perhaps a stray rumble. Quiet weather Friday and Saturday, then
another system brings more rain to start the next week.

&&

.NEAR TERM /THROUGH TONIGHT/...
As of 110 AM Thursday...

Low level moisture continues to pool ahead of a slow moving cold
front just now approaching the Ohio River. Although activity has
been fairly muted across the forecast through much of the overnight
so far, should begin to see existing activity over eastern KY spill
into our E KY and W WV counties in the next couple hours as well as
currently isolated activity ahead of the front increase in
coverage as quality of ~H850 moisture increases. This should
yield a swath of one quarter to perhaps locally three quarters
of an inch of rainfall from just north of the Metro Valley down
into portions of the Southern Coalfields through this afternoon.
Instability will be rather limited, perhaps a couple hundred
J/kg of MUCAPE and equilibrium levels will only marginally
approach the -20C isotherm. Will include a mention of a slight
chance of thunder, but have capped probabilities to less than
20%.

As the front approaches the higher terrain, moisture quality begins
to decrease and weakly divergent flow aloft begins to fade which
should result in a downtick in any precipitation coverage. This will
yield lesser precipitation amounts on some of the areas of the
Southern Coalfields which have been dealing with a higher density of
wildfire over the last couple days.

Precipitation largely fades by late afternoon, but a secondary wind
max arriving this evening may be able to squeeze out some additional
light rain across the south.

As high pressure builds in Friday morning, any areas that clear
(mainly SE Ohio) will start to see fog developing.

&&

.SHORT TERM /FRIDAY THROUGH SATURDAY/...
As of 215 AM Thursday...

Some clouds linger along the mountains and western slopes to
start on Friday, but any shower activity should be clear of the
area. A bit of morning fog is also possible over parts of SE
Ohio and also perhaps along the higher ridges in the southeast
part of the CWA as low stratus runs into and over the terrain.
All of this should quickly clear through the morning hours, with
the rest of Friday into Saturday morning being clear, dry, and
calm. There could be some valley fog Friday night, but a lot of
that will depend on just how dry the air is behind the front.
As of right now, any fog looks to be patchy in nature outside
of the Tygart Valley area, including Elkins. Clouds will start
to increase some Saturday afternoon as the peak of the upper-
level ridge slides east of us and we start getting some high
clouds streaming in from the southwest.

Highs both days will generally be 60s to around 70 degrees in
lower elevations, with 50s to low 60s in the mountains. Cooler
than the first half of this week, but still a good bit above
average. Under clear and mostly calm conditions Friday night,
lows will dip into the 30s for most, with some lower 40s in the
Huntington Tri-State area and southern coalfields.

&&

.LONG TERM /SATURDAY NIGHT THROUGH WEDNESDAY/...
As of 245 AM Thursday...

High and mid-level clouds thicken Saturday night as a warm front
pushes across the Mid-South and up the Ohio Valley towards our
area. However, developing SE`ly winds on the `cool` side of the
front will likely help to hold off precip until well after
midnight through downsloping and resultant low-level drying.
Still, the encroaching moisture with the front will eventually
win out, and some rain should start to move in during the late
overnight hours, with likely POPs pushing into the western part
of the CWA by sunrise on Sunday. Going through the rest of
Sunday and Sunday night, more widespread showers and some broad
areas of rain are expected as the cold front pushes towards us
during the day, and then through the area overnight. A few
thunderstorms are also possible. Some solutions are hinting at
the potential for a `dry slot` in between the passage of the
warm front off to the north and the approach of the cold front
from the west. That would cut into the forecast rain totals, so
we`ll have to monitor that potential, especially once the
mesoscale models come in range.

Precip quickly tapers off late Sunday night into Monday for most
of the area, though a few mountain rain showers may linger
during the day on Monday. The deterministic Canadian shows a
more potent and deeper trailing shortwave bringing some showers
to the area Monday evening and night, but it seems to stand
alone in this regard. Much of other deterministic guidance shows
a shortwave, but weaker, drier, and staying too far north to
impact us in any way, and no real support can be found in the
ensemble guidance, either. We should be dry Tuesday and most of
Wednesday, but some uncertainty on the timing and strength of a
potential system moving across the Midwest brings uncertainty on
POP timing between later Wednesday and Thursday.

We likely linger near to a bit warmer than normal for the first
few days of next week, with a brief surge warmer possible for
mid-week as S-SE`ly downsloping winds develop ahead of the
anticipated next system.


&&

.AVIATION /07Z THURSDAY THROUGH MONDAY/...
As of 110 AM Thursday...

A weak cold front slowly sags south across the area today yielding
MVFR/IFR ceilings and light to occasionally moderate rain with a few
embedded rumbles possible. At this time confidence is too low to
include TSRA or VCTS at any terminals. Ceilings improve after
frontal passage with skies eventually starting to clear from north
to south overnight tonight. At least patchy fog will be possible
where skies to clear, mainly after 06Z.

Light and variable winds ahead of the front shift out of the north
post FROPA, generally less than 10KTs.

FORECAST CONFIDENCE AND ALTERNATE SCENARIOS THROUGH 06Z FRIDAY...

FORECAST CONFIDENCE: Medium for cig/vis with cold frontal
passage.

ALTERNATE SCENARIOS: Timing and extent of MVFR/IFR ceilings may
vary from forecast. Isolated TSRA possible near HTS/CRW late
morning.


EXPERIMENTAL TABLE OF FLIGHT CATEGORY OBJECTIVELY SHOWS CONSISTENCY
OF WFO FORECAST TO AVAILABLE MODEL INFORMATION:
H = HIGH:   TAF CONSISTENT WITH ALL MODELS OR ALL BUT ONE MODEL.
M = MEDIUM: TAF HAS VARYING LEVEL OF CONSISTENCY WITH MODELS.
L = LOW:    TAF INCONSISTENT WITH ALL MODELS OR ALL BUT ONE MODEL.

DATE                                   THU 11/07/24
UTC 1HRLY       06   07   08   09   10   11   12   13   14   15   16   17
EST 1HRLY       01   02   03   04   05   06   07   08   09   10   11   12
CRW CONSISTENCY  H    H    M    H    H    M    H    H    H    H    H    L
HTS CONSISTENCY  M    M    H    H    H    H    H    H    H    H    H    H
BKW CONSISTENCY  H    H    H    H    H    H    L    L    H    H    M    M
EKN CONSISTENCY  H    H    H    H    M    H    M    M    H    M    H    H
PKB CONSISTENCY  L    H    H    H    H    H    M    H    H    M    M    M
CKB CONSISTENCY  H    H    H    M    H    M    L    H    M    H    H    H

AFTER 06Z FRIDAY...
IFR conditions are possible with fog and stratus Friday morning,
particularly across mountains, and in river valley fog early
Saturday morning.

&&

.RLX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
WV...None.
OH...None.
KY...None.
VA...None.

&&

$$

SYNOPSIS...FK/JP
NEAR TERM...JP
SHORT TERM...FK
LONG TERM...FK
AVIATION...JP