Update
No changes made to the inherited forecast. The previous discussion remains below along with an updated marine/aviation section:
What is an Area Forecast Discussion?
Area Forecast Discussions are the real forecasts, written 3 to 4 times daily by NWS meteorologists reading the models and interpreting what they mean for your area. They offer far deeper insight than any weather app, but they're written in dense meteorological shorthand. Plaincast uses Anthropic's Claude to summarize them into plain English, side by side with the annotated original.
Revised in 5 passages since the 2:49 PM discussion. See every revision.
Synopsis
A weak system will brush the area Tuesday with cooler temperatures and showers mainly to the coast, Olympic Peninsula and north interior. Conditions will trend dry and warmer Wednesday through Friday, followed by cooler and potentially showery weather for some areas over the weekend.
Short Term
Temperatures running about 5 to 10 degrees warmer this afternoon over yesterday, but still near normal. A weak system remains on track to brush the area Tuesday morning, mainly clipping the northwestern third of the area with what looks to be another round of light rain for the coast, Olympic Peninsula and Whatcom County. the blend-of-models forecast is showing a 15% chance of thunder over northern Whatcom County during the afternoon hours. For all other areas, expect little more than a chance of light rain or drizzle mainly during the morning and a bit more cloud cover into the afternoon hours.
Wednesday looks to be a transitional day, with morning stratus and afternoon sunshine. High temperatures will likely run a few degrees warmer than Tuesday, but remain pretty close to normal.
Long Term
Ensembles continue to highlight the persistent upstream tough and southwesterly flow aloft Thursday. Upper level heights will begin to creep up with highs Thursday in some spots along the foothills and Cascade valleys and areas south of Puget Sound warming into the lower 80s. Friday continues to look like the warmest with a 80-90% chance of highs at or above 80F over the interior lowlands from King County Southward. Even with the warmer temperatures, HeatRisk values are expected to remain Minor (yellow) for much of the area with impacts primarily to those individuals extremely sensitive to heat especially if outdoors without adequate cooling or hydration.
Ensembles settling on a cooler and potentially showery pattern for the weekend. The most likely scenario looks to be showers along the coast with widespread cloud cover and cooler temperatures over the interior. Highs will likely run near- to slightly cooler than normal.
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