AccuWeather's Joe Lundberg looks ahead to next week's weather for the U.S., which includes a late-week fire threat in the South Central states, snow in the northern Plains and storms in the South.
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00:00You told us about it back on February 28th and that's one of the big highlights for next week.
00:05It really is. I think it's one of the bigger highlights as you're going to see a big spring
00:08warm-up across a good chunk of the country with temperatures well above historical averages from
00:13the plains all the way to the eastern seaboard. It's not a one-day visit of this warm-up. I think
00:18it's going to last for several days in many locations. There are bigger concerns though.
00:22There's a storm that's going to come into California, rain and snow for that, but as it
00:25comes out across the plains, there's a late-week fire threat from New Mexico into the plains
00:30and that storm system will spread some snow across the northern plains, but also a severe
00:35weather threat farther to the south and east. We'll detail that over the next couple of moments.
00:38Here's the jet stream as it's going to look like over the next several days. You can see this
00:42feature here coming out of the southern Rockies this weekend and into the southern plains. That's
00:46going to generate quite a bit of wind in these areas and a risk for some blowing dust and some
00:51a high fire threat. Then that settles down late in the weekend, but then you look
00:54out to the west. Here's this feature with a little kicker in behind it. This wind is going
00:59to bring quite a bit of unsettled weather to California. A lot of rain, which you need getting
01:02down to the southern California. A lot of snow in the Sierra, but it's part of the pattern change.
01:07You see that trough in the west? Guess what? Downstream you've got a ridge and underneath this
01:11you've got a lot of warm air. We're going to see that for day after day after day.
01:15Look at these temperatures early next week. We're talking 60s and 70s widespread across
01:20the plains states and that's going to be spreading into the eastern seaboard.
01:23Philadelphia you probably get to 60 degrees on Monday and maybe into the upper 60s by Tuesday
01:28and it's not just a one or two day affair. You look at this on Wednesday. We're talking
01:32highs 60s in Denver, 70s in Wichita, St. Louis, Memphis, 78 in Charlotte, 80s in Dallas and
01:38Houston. So a lot of warm weather going to be spread across a lot of the country, Bernie.
01:42Yeah, and this time of the year though, Joe, we always are concerned when we see these storms
01:48coming into California. If they're strong enough, they can cause mischief and mayhem
01:54in the central part of the United States. We saw that with our storm this week and we do have
01:59concerns late next week. Yeah, there's going to be a system that will come out, I think,
02:04early to midweek and then work its way eastward. I think any severe weather threat with that is
02:08going to be confined to perhaps the Gulf Coast region, parts of maybe East Texas, Louisiana,
02:13over to the Florida Panhandle. I'm not terribly worried about that as a widespread thing,
02:17but as the second system comes out of the southwest, several aspects of it. To the south
02:21and east where it's bone dry, you're going to see strong winds gusting to 40, 50 miles per hour or
02:26better, blowing dust and a high fire threat. I'm really worried about that. On the northwest side,
02:31you've got cold air, so you've got snow and wind and a potential for blizzard conditions. But to
02:35the south and east, and it may not be just this area, I'm concerned there could even be some
02:39severe weather that gets this far north as that system rolls eastward late next week and next
02:44weekend. So it was March, February 28th. You gave us the heads up about a big warmup coming
02:50from mid-March. It is now mid-March. What's the one big thing we should get ready for
02:56for the end of March? Well, you know, the warmth is going to be coming for the central plains of
03:01the east. You're going to have several days of it. But if you look out into long range,
03:05the concern is that you may see some ridging that develops in the western part of the country.
03:09When that happens, you get a downstream trough and west-northwest flow. Often that means that
03:13spring's probably going to be on hold for the upper midwest, the Great Lakes, into the northeast.
03:17You're going to have some setbacks, I hate to say it, as you go through late March and into
03:21the month of April. And that's something that you and long-range meteorologist Paul Pasolak
03:25have been warning about for this spring, that it could be delayed from the lakes to the northeast.