textproduct: Newport/Morehead City

WHAT HAS CHANGED

Decreased rain chances on Friday

KEY MESSAGES

1) Mostly quiet weather with steadily increasing moisture. Sea breeze worth monitoring on Wednesday.

2) A cold front will move through on Thursday, bringing gusty winds and scattered to numerous showers and thunderstorms, some of which could be strong to severe.

3) High pressure will build in Friday and bring a brief round of dry conditions.

DISCUSSION

KEY MESSAGE 1..High pressure has shifted offshore and SW flow will continue to advect in moisture. Temps will warm through Wednesday in response, reaching the low/mid 80s inland and mid/upper 70s at the beaches.

If we're able to overcome the dry layer between 700-850 mb, Wednesday's seabreeze could produce some isolated showers and storms, but guidance is not excited about convective potential. Machine learning guidance shows low severe probs (10% or less), but decent bulk shear and a LLJ could help produce a few stronger gusts within any convection that's able to develop. Precip chances will continue to increase into the night as a cold front approaches from the northwest.

KEY MESSAGE 2...A positively tilted upper-level trough will move across the Midwest on Thursday, becoming neutral to negatively tilted over the eastern US Thursday night. At the surface, a cold front will move into ENC late Thursday afternoon/early evening and push offshore by Thursday night.

Scattered showers and thunderstorms are expected through the day, and there's a low but non-zero chance for some storms to be strong to marginally severe. Forcing will be lacking in the morning, and depending on the coverage of showers and thunderstorms ahead of the evening front, destabilization may be dampened. Ample bulk shear will be present throughout the day, however, and the low that's expected to form along the front could produce an area of enhanced lift, but chances for severe storms remain low at this time (< 10%). Current QPF ranges from 0.5-1" with highest totals west of Highway 17.

In addition to showers and storms, Thursday will bring strong SW winds with gusts to 20-25 mph inland and 25-35 mph along the coast.

KEY MESSAGE 3...Surface high pressure will briefly build in on Friday. This should help keep most of the precipitation associated with the low along the offshore front south of our area, but isolated light showers along the immediate coast can't be ruled out Friday night as the high moves offshore. As the aforementioned offshore low moves northeast off the coast of the Carolinas on Saturday, showers will be possible with greatest chances near the water.

MARINE

Latest obs show SW winds at 10-20 kt and seas at 2-4 ft. These conditions will persist through tonight.

Outlook: SW winds will increase to 20-25 kt with gusts to 25-30 kt Wednesday night. These conditions will persist until Thursday evening when prefrontal SW winds will increase to 20-30 kt with gusts to 25-35 kt. Winds will veer to the NW Thursday night behind the front with seas peaking at 5-9 ft. Winds will decrease to 15-20 kt with gusts to 20-25 kt by Friday morning with good boating conditions returning by the afternoon.

Thunderstorms, some of which could produce strong gusts, will be possible on Thursday as well.

MHX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

NC...None. MARINE...None.