Don’t stash the rain gear away just yet! Tomorrow afternoon and evening brings another chance for showers. Coming up, we’ll pick up the most amount of rain Saturday morning.
All the recent rain has really helped chip away at the drought. The latest U.S. Drought Monitor was released today and show’s more improvements for Massachusetts. The driest conditions reside mainly across the Cape and Islands. Seven percent of the state is “abnormally dry.” That’s down from 40% last week. Four percent of the state is still in “moderate drought.” Compare that to three months ago, when more than half of the state, 64%, was in moderate drought.
Every Saturday this month has featured a bit of wet weather (from a trace amount of rainfall to nearly half an inch), and this Saturday will be no different. We’ve had more wet days this month than dry, so our May rain bucket is overflowing! Boston and Worcester’s rainfall amounts are more than half a foot and more than 4″ above average. As of now, this is the fifth wettest May on record in Boston and fourth wettest in Worcester. We could come in higher before the month is over thanks to Saturday’s expected rain.
Here’s a look at future radar for Friday and the chance for pop-up showers in the afternoon. Once we lose daytime heating around sunset, showers will fizzle out. If you get caught under a shower, the rain could be heavy so you might want to have an umbrella with you.
Developing low pressure will move off the Mid-Atlantic coast and over New England Friday night into Saturday. That will bring us a good soaking rain to start the weekend. Saturday morning will be the wettest time frame with downpours and lightning possible.
Here’s a closer look at the timing…
Rain moves in while we’re sleeping early Saturday morning. I think the wettest period will be early Saturday morning. Then drier air starts to punch in through the mid-morning hours. The afternoon is dry with developing sunshine. A second round of showers moves in Saturday night past 7pm. This batch won’t be as heavy. Some showers linger Sunday morning.
Once again we could have some decent rainfall amounts with this storm. The highest amounts will be inland, while lower amounts will be for southeast Mass. You can see that trend below from the European and American models respectively.
We turn the calendar to June on Sunday. The 8-14 day precipitation outlook predicts near normal conditions for at least part of the beginning of June.
-Meteorologist Melanie Black