THE EARLY FALL HEAT WAVE IS OVER... A MAJOR RAIN EVENT IS EXPECTED IN SOME PARTS OF THE EASTERN STATES MONDAY AND TUESDAY... HOW MUCH RAIN WILL WE REC

A stalling cold front will bring us some cloudiness on Sunday, but all in all, it shouldn't be a bad day. It will be cooler than it was on Saturday. The front will begin to turn back northward on Monday. Meanwhile, a large surge of moisture will be feeding in from the Gulf of Mexico and then eventually the Atlantic Ocean as a low pressure system forms to our west. This low will lift north into the Ohio Valley. Some areas of N.C. and VA. are expected to receive significant rainfall over the next few days. The question for us is will we get in on any of this moisture. The discussion out of the Wakefield NWS office was not available this morning, but I did read it last night. There seemed to be a lot of uncertainty as to how much rainfall we would receive. Western VA will most likely get the lion's share of rainfall from this system. Up-sloping winds will enhance the rainfall there. The drought has been quite persistent out that way so this is good news. However, the drought has also been severe just west of Hampton Roads and I am hoping that this area receives some beneficial rainfall over the next couple of days. It appears that a cold front that will swing through Hampton Roads later Tuesday and Wednesday should touch off some showers/storms here but we'll have to see what happens. It's been two weeks since we've seen rain here locally so things are getting quite dry, especially since it has been so warm of late. What about the tropics? Some forecasters believe that tropical trouble may be brewing by mid-week in the Caribbean or Gulf of Mexico. The computer models have been quite persistent in showing some type of low pressure (whether it be tropical in nature or not) developing and moving northward towards Florida. Forecasters will be keep their eyes on this are this upcoming week for sure.