Taste of Spring to Grace Central, Northeastern US Next Week

By Alex Sosnowski, AccuWeather.com Senior Meteorologist

March 7,2015; 10:22PM,EST

 

 

As arctic air is held at bay, warmth will build from the West to the Central states, while the temperatures rebound to seasonable levels in the Northeast through the first half of the coming week.
A change in the weather pattern will turn off arctic air invasions to allow the March sun to go to work over much of the central and northeastern United States.
While the official arrival of spring is a couple of weeks away, winter is finally showing signs of wavering.
According to AccuWeather.com Meteorologist Mark Paquette, "Compared to what people have been through this February, the weather next week should feel much more comfortable from the Plains to the East."

The pattern will be more than just a tease for a day and is likely to bring the highest weekly average temperatures since last December in many areas of the Midwest and East.
While the extensive snow cover and ice on area streams and rivers will remain a concern for flooding and ice jams moving forward through March, a significant amount of snow cover will be lost.
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The extensive snow cover will balance out the warmup in the Upper Midwest and Northeast.
"As successive high pressure areas settle in, the combination of snow cover and clear, calm conditions at night will allow for some chilly early morning low temperatures in the Northeast," Paquette said.
As a result, the Northeast will not get as warm as areas farther west in the central Plains.
Despite this, daytime highs should reach or exceed average during multiple days for the middle of March, even in the Northeast.

The strengthening March sun results in average temperatures trending upward by a degree every few days during the middle and latter part of the month.
Temperatures will climb into the 40s and 50s around the Great Lakes and into the 50s and 60s over parts of the Plains and the Ohio and Tennessee valleys for the first half of the coming week.

In the Northeast, highs most days will range from the upper 30s to the 40s in New England and the 40s and 50s farther south in the mid-Atlantic.
While not as harsh as the arctic blasts from February, colder air will dip back into the Northeast later in the week as a storm system pushes northward from the Gulf of Mexico.
AccuWeather.com meteorologists will be monitoring this storm for potential flooding rain, snow and even ice implications in the Northeast next weekend.