Increasing Clouds, Warmer, Rain Late

A few passing high clouds and a south wind have kept temperatures from falling too far this morning at GTR, but areas that have seen light to calm winds are below freezing this morning. Despite the cold temperatures this morning, we'll rebound nicely this afternoon with our warmest day in almost a week. The big warm up is due to our next storm system organizing over the Four Corners. This system will dig into Texas before ejecting eastward into the Southeast later tonight. As the trough digs in, it will also amplify a weak ridge over the region and allow warm air advection to commence.

The big question about how warm we get today will be controlled by how quickly the cloud cover arrives. The main band of clouds is still back in Western Arkansas and Northeast Texas with clear skies ahead of the band. If this scenario plays out, we should have a longer duration with mostly sunny skies which will allow us to warm into the 60s. With more sunshine, I think we will mix higher than both the GFS and NAM suggest so I'll forecast a high of 64 today.

Skies will be cloudy by this evening and rain chances will increase early Thursday morning as a cold front approaches the area. The trend in the models has been to slow down the timing of the system and it looks like tomorrow morning will be the wet after the cold front passes in the early morning. Severe weather doesn't look likely for our area with this system arriving during the morning hours. With the frontal passage, temperatures will fall quickly and should be around 45 tomorrow morning.