Sunday, January 5, 2014

interesting week ahead... (pm.05.jan.14)>

Sunday's stats:

Low temp: 40.6F (4.8C)
High temp: 50.9F (10.5C)
24 hour precipitation: 0.10" (3mm)

There are some patches of clouds lingering around the area just after sunset this evening as temperatures drop back into the mid-40s(F).  Other than billowing clouds over the mountains from the late morning through the afternoon, we had a good amount of sunshine today.  That made it feel more comfortable than yesterday when we had more clouds, scattered showers and gusty winds -- though actual high temps were the same.  It looks like there were some rain and snow showers up along the Dhauladhars this afternoon, but it has been dry in McLeod since last evening's rain showers.

Temperatures aloft are very cold, thanks to that upper-level circulation which is still loitering just to our northwest.  The average moisture content of our air mass is low, however, and that means the instability factor doesn't have much fuel to work with for the production of any significant precipitation.  Apart from the off-chance of a passing rain/snow shower somewhere in our vicinity overnight, it should be dry for at least the next 48 hours or so as the atmosphere begins to realign itself in advance of the next weather event.

As a new,stronger upper-level storm system approaches from the west late Tuesday night, it will attempt to draw some moisture northward ahead of it -- though how much remains to be seen -- leading to an increasing chance of rain and snow all across Himalayan north India by Wednesday.  There will actually be two separate upper-level systems between Wednesday and Saturday, so we could see at least a couple of waves of precipitation during that time period, along with temperatures cold enough to bring the rain/snow line very close to at least the upper parts of our area -- i.e. Dharamkot, Naddi and Upper Bhagsu.  Although this isn't looking like a super-strong winter storm at this point, it's not a bad idea to get prepared for any eventualities as things come together during the coming few days...

The CURRENT FORECAST details can be found on the tab above.