February 11, 2018

Another Sunny Day

Current Conditions

Temperature: 17 degrees, feels like 6 degrees
Dew Point: 2 degrees
Winds: WSW 9 mph
Pressure: 1019.3 mb
Visibility: 10 miles

This morning started out clear and sunny with a temperature of -1 feeling like -9 degrees and SW winds at 3 mph. Nothing much changed over the day and by early afternoon the temperature had peaked at 17 degrees with winds WSW at 12 mph.  The temperature was still 17 degrees at 5:00 PM this evening and winds were WSW at 9 mph. The dew point is currently 2 degrees, which is farther from the temperature than yesterday indicating the moisture content of the air has gone down slightly.

Although there still isn't any interesting weather going on in Wisconsin, the winter storm is causing some hazardous conditions in the eastern and southern portion of the country. There will be rain in the southern and mid-Atlantic states with snow in the Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire area tonight going into tomorrow.  The map in Figure 1 below shows the belt of rain with the low and high pressure fronts.

Figure 1. Rain belt in the southern and mid-Atlantic portion of the country denoted by the green areas.

Figure 2 shows the wind directions, specifically the strong winds with large amounts of moisture coming up through the Gulf of Mexico that are aiding in the heavy rains in the southern part of the United States.

Figure 2. Strong winds coming from the Gulf of Mexico bringing high moisture content to the States.

My prediction from yesterday was correct except for the high temperature. There were sunny skies and slightly higher temperatures but they only reached 17 degrees, not the low 20s.

For tomorrow, I predict more sunny skies and low teens for temperatures because of the cold air mass following the high pressure front (Figure 1) that will likely be hovering over Wisconsin tomorrow.