On Memorial Day weekend the chill and rain will be memorable in Philly and at the Shore
Saturday could set a record for coolness. The rains at least should ease drought conditions.
The Philadelphia region at long last is about to experience generous rains that have been missing all spring as drought conditions have persisted. But for millions in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast, the atmosphere’s timing couldn’t be much worse.
Some rain is possible all three days of a Memorial Day weekend that is going to feel more like Halloween. Driven by a raw wind off the ocean, Saturday could even set a record for coolness.
After a dry and cool day Friday, “It will get worse before it gets better,” said Bob Larsen, senior meteorologist with AccuWeather Inc. It’s possible that rain totals could reach 2 to 2.5 inches during the weekend — double what has fallen the first three weeks of May.
The National Weather Service even mentioned “cold air damming,” the trapping of chilly air near the surface, a phenomenon more appropriate to New Year’s.
Why now? That’s would be a reasonable question among those who were planning picnics, or trips to the Shore, or attending or staging Memorial Day services. “I’ve been pummeled by friends and family,” said Larsen.
However, those who expect beach weather on Memorial Day weekends probably haven’t been around here too long. It’s been worse — and not that long ago.
It will be on the chilly, wet side from North Carolina to New England, said Marc Chenard, senior branch forecaster with the Weather Prediction Center, in College Park, Md.
On the bright side for the Philly region, save for Saturday when it will be in the core of the chill, the weekend forecast isn’t wall-to-wall ugly.
The Philly and Shore forecasts Saturday through Monday
Rain was expected to begin very late Friday night — probably after the Phillies’ game — and continue steadily through Saturday and and into Sunday.
Saturday’s forecast high in the mid-50s would challenge the Philly record for a low maximum for a May 23, 56 degrees. That’s about 20 degrees below normal.
The storm may not be a nor’easter. It will just look and feel like one. It will be traveling along an “undulating” frontal boundary to the south of the region, the weather center says.
Onshore winds from the east off the ocean, where water temperatures were in the upper 50s this week, will gust to 25 mph inland, and 30 mph at the beaches.
For Sunday, the steady rain should be over by the afternoon, said Larsen, with just an outside chance of showers. It will be about 10 degrees or more warmer.
More showers are possible Monday, he said, but they will be hit and miss, and most of the time it should be dry. Temperatures may climb into the 70s if the sun decides to reappear.
Let the summer begin ... eventually, anyway
Ocean City beaches will be open, and guarded, said town spokesperson Doug Bergen. if it rains Monday morning, the ceremony scheduled for Veterans Memorial Park at 11 a.m. will move across the street to the Ocean City Tabernacle.
In Atlantic City, Mayor Marty Small Jr. is presiding at the annual “Opening of the Sea” ceremony Friday afternoon, ostensibly to mark what he and other Shore officials call “the start of the summer season.”
The Atlantic may be open, but the ocean won’t be especially inviting this weekend, with a rough surf and potentially dangerous riptides.
As uninviting as the forecast may be, it’s likely to lose a game of one-downmanship with the chilly, wet Memorial Day weekend of 2021, when Philadelphia set records on back-to-back days for low daily maximum temperatures, not getting above 54.
The summer solstice is still almost a month away, regardless of what Shore officials say.
