Forecast Last Updated at Friday, August 8, 2008 at 12:30PM

Will it ever rain again?

A front rolled across our area Thursday evening. It's now to our south and east allowing cooler, drier air to overtake the Southern Appalachians. That dry, cool NW flow will dominate our weather well into next week. We can expect pleasant temperatures (chilly in valleys at night) and dry weather through early next week.

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.

Friday Hi: 73 Lo: 49 Lots of sun; Pleasant and less humid; NW wind 5-15 mph with higher gusts at times

Saturday Hi: 77 Lo: 51 Mostly sunny; Pleasant; Light wind

Sunday Hi: 77 Lo: 51 Mostly clear; Continued nice; NW wind 5-10 mph

Monday Hi: 77 Lo: 55 Scattered PM clouds; Near normal temps

Tuesday Hi: 78 Lo: 58 Scattered clouds; Continued pleasant temps

Further Out

Wednesday - Partly cloudy; An isolated afternoon t-shower possible; High in the upper 70s; Low in the upper 50s
Thursday - Scattered clouds; An isolated afternoon t-shower possible; High in the upper 70s; Low near 60 degrees

Forecast Discussion

A western ridge/eastern trough pattern has been established and will remain in place as far as the weather eye can see. That places us in a cool, dry NW flow. Today and well into next week, we can expect dry weather, pleasant temperatures. Skies will range from mostly clear to partly cloudy. The most notable issue will be valley temperatures falling to the 40s at night this weekend. As temperatures creep back up toward the end of the 7-day forecast (still within pleasant levels), we'll throw in an isolated afternoon thundershower for Wednesday and Thursday but even that is not a whole-hearted endorsement. The next better chance for any rain of note looks to be Friday or Saturday of NEXT week.

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, the situation will only get worse in the short-term. 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.