Forecast Last Updated at Thursday, August 7, 2008 at 12:32PM

A Few Thundershowers Today

Isolated showers and a possible t-shower are expected as we work our way through the afternoon hours on this Thursday, however some will escape the afternoon with no rain at all. A front comes through tonight ushering in drier, cooler air. Expect pleasant weather through the weekend. How about valley lows in the 40s this weekend?

We spent many hours pouring through 870 entries in the 2009 Ray's Weather Center Calendar Photo Contest and have reduced the number to about 35 finalists for each season. We need you to help with the final selections. It will be a hard job because these are by far the best set of photos we have ever received. Please go to 2009 Ray's Weather Center Calendar Photo Contest page and vote for your favorite photos. Voting will end August 20 and winners will be announced by September 1.

Thursday Hi: 78 Lo: 56 More clouds than sun; Muggy; Isolated showers and t-showers; NW wind 5-15 mph

Friday Hi: 75 Lo: 49 Lots of sun; Pleasant; NW wind 5-15 mph

Saturday Hi: 75 Lo: 48 Mostly sunny; Pleasant; Light wind

Sunday Hi: 76 Lo: 50 Mostly clear; Continued nice

Monday Hi: 76 Lo: 57 Scattered PM clouds; Near normal temps

Further Out

Tuesday - Partly cloudy; Scattered PM thunder possible; High in the mid 70s; Low in the upper 50s
Wednesday - Partly cloudy; Chance of a PM t-shower; High in the mid 70s; Low in the upper 50s

Forecast Discussion

A front lies from West Virginia to the Boothill of Missouri to the Oklahoma Panhandle. It will slide slowly to the south and east today passing through our area tonight. As we head through the afternoon hours, isolated showers and a possible t-shower are expected. It's not the widespread rains we would like, but at this point, we'll take anything we can get, especially since we have a dry forecast for the next several days.

Associated with the frontal passage, a trough is digging into the Eastern US and will be the dominate force in our weather for the next 6-7 days. Drier, cooler air from the NW will be over us Friday through Monday. We can expect temperatures at or below normal. Nighttime temperatures in valleys will be particularly cool. Skies will be mostly clear with a few afternoon clouds popping up. The air will be extremely dry, eliminating rain chances through this period.

A weak front will approach Tuesday night. I don't expect much rain with this next system, but a few mostly PM thundershowers will be possible Tuesday and Wednesday.

The rain we have received of late continues to be well below normal totals. We are now about 9" below normal rainfall for the year. That's a 25% deficit. This on top of a parched 2007 leaves us in "severe" to "extreme" drought conditions. Stream flows are near all-time lows. The extreme SW corner of NC is nearing the worst drought on record. As described in this forecast, we see no relief in sight. Now through October, our best hope is moisture from a tropical system.

Announcements

RaysWeather.Com continues to grow. We are an "information age" company using the web to broadcast the message but also as a tool for producing the message. RaysWeather.Com (what we call RWC) has evolved from "Ray's hobby in Beautiful Downtown Rutherwood" in 1999 to the most widely read media outlet in NW NC reaching 150,000 to 200,000 people per month and covering the weather from NC/VA line to Asheville and Wolf Laurel. We will continue to grow geographically as well--Roaring Gap and Waynesville were recently added; Black Mountain will be up and running very soon. The heart of the growth is good data, "local flavor", and THE most reliable forecast.

We recently added our 6th forecaster to the best forecast team ever assembled for this region. It's time for us to introduce "the crew"...

• Dr. Ray Russell is a Computer Science professor at Appalachian State University. His PhD is in Computer Science from Georgia Tech (1989); weather has been a long-time passion. He started posting a "snow forecast" on the university website back in the mid 1990's; this evolved into RaysWeather.Com in 2000. Ray lives in Boone and has taught at Appalachian State since 1991.
• Eric Anderson (RWC's Chief Meteorologist) received his degree in meteorology from the University of North Carolina at Asheville, and is a 15-year veteran of NOAA with experience in forecasting, observation and analysis. A native of western North Carolina, Eric's former tenure in the National Weather Service gave him the opportunity to forecast for areas of the Mid-Atlantic region. His professional interests include upslope flow snow events in the southern Appalachians, as well as cold air damming in the Carolinas.
• Alan Simons, born in Fayetteville NC, has a Bachelor of Science in meteorology and almost 20 years of professional experience that includes forecasting for newspapers, websites, radio, aviation, and the military. He first became interested in weather in North Carolina, and RWC takes him back home after a variety of duty stations, from New York to Hawaii. Alan's been with the RWC team since 2003.
• Tim Kirby joined Ray's Weather Center in October 2004 and lives in his hometown of Fries, VA (pronounced Freeze). The folks from this small Grayson County town say "it's freeze in winter and fries in summer". He has a Bachelor of Science degree in Meteorology from NC State University. While at NC State, he was president of the NCSU Student Chapter of the American Meteorological Society. Before joining RWC, Tim worked for the National Weather Service for ten years in Raleigh, Chattanooga and Morristown, Tennessee. Tim has always loved the challenge of forecasting and owes his dedication to a childhood fascination of snow (no school!).
• Harold Alston is a N.C. native with Bachelor of Science degrees from both App State (Broadcast Communications) and UNC-Asheville (Meteorology). He has 30 years experience tracking and forecasting NC weather including 15 years experience for media outlets. Nailing down Appalachian wedges & wintry possibilities are his areas of expertise with a lifetime of N.C. weather experiences to reference.
• Jeff Cox, a native of Asheville, is the latest addition to the RWC team. He earned a Bachelor of Sciences in Atmospheric Sciences from UNC-Asheville. At UNC-A, he was the lead forecaster for the school's Weather Forecast Line, campus Radio Station, "The Blue Echo" and the campus newspaper, "The Blue Banner." Jeff has experience as a meteorologist in both television and radio. He spent over 2 years in Macon, GA, as the chief meteorologist at WGXA FOX-24. He also has experience as a radio broadcast meteorologist for The Weather Channel in Atlanta, Georgia.