The forecast played out perfectly today, as wind quickly ramped up this morning. Most of the area received wind gusts between 50 and 60 mph, with some over 60 mph, and the results were dramatic: hundreds of thousands of people without power, trees blown onto houses, limbs taking down power lines, and even some structural damage. Before getting to the forecast, I cannot emphasize enough two very important points:
1. Stay far away from any downed power line, and call 911 immediately if you see one. Don’t EVER assume that power has been cut to a line. Even if the line isn’t arcing (“sparking”), it still can be a hot wire, and you can be electrocuted…with deadly consequences.
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2. Traffic lights are out at many intersections (I experienced several myself on my drive into work). If you encounter an intersection with the traffic lights out, you MUST treat that as a four-way stop. I saw some near-crashes today as people just drove through intersections without even slowing down. I wish I had a dashboard Go-Pro to record this so I could show it to you. It’s perfectly fine if someone has such little regard for their own life and wants to make a risky choice like this (go ahead and remove yourself from the gene pool…really, it’s okay), but it is NOT okay to assign the same level of risk to the rest of us.
You’ll be quite surprised to see how quickly the strong gusts subside early this evening. While it’ll still be breezy for a few hours after sunset, after midnight the wind will drop below 10 mph! Mostly clear skies early should become partly cloudy later tonight. Lows in the upper 20s (-2 to -1 degree Celsius).
Becoming cloudy on Thursday, with some light snow possible south of 8 Mile by late afternoon into the evening hours. As you can see on my 4ZONE Forecast below, this looks like just a dusting…under an inch…for those areas that do get snow. Highs near 40 degrees (4 to 5 degrees Celsius), with a west-southwest wind at 5 to 10 mph. Thursday’s sunrise is at 6:55 a.m., and Thursday’s sunset is at 6:33 p.m.
Snow quickly ends Thursday night, with lows in the low to mid 20s (-5 degrees Celsius).
Partly cloudy on Friday and much colder than recently, with highs in the low 30s (-1 to 0 degrees Celsius). It’ll also be a breezy day, which will make it feel even colder.
Partly cloudy and very cold Friday night, with lows near 10 degrees (-12 degrees Celsius).
Partly cloudy Saturday, with highs in the upper 20s (-2 degrees Celsius).
Partly cloudy Saturday night, with lows in the low teens (-11 degrees Celsius).
Partly cloudy on Sunday, with highs in the low 30s (0 degrees Celsius).
Our next chance for snow comes Monday into Monday night, but this also doesn’t look like anything big.