Josh Classen's forecast: Cooler, but far from cold this week

The outlook flipped in a big way over the weekend. More on that in a moment, but first let's just deal with the next few days.

Temperatures should get a handful of degrees above 0 C today and we'll end up with a high in the 5 to 10 C range on Tuesday.

Sunshine today and then some clouds increasing Tuesday.

Some colder air drops in for Wednesday and we'll probably stay below 0 C throughout the day.

Flurries or light snow is possible late in the day Wednesday, but probably no significant snow for the Edmonton region.

Beyond Wednesday, there's a bit of uncertainty with the daytime high forecast for Thursday-Saturday.

BUT...at this point, it looks like the cooler air will get bounced and we'll have afternoon highs in the 2 to 5 C range.

Skip ahead if you just want the forecast. OR...read on if you're interested in why this week's forecast has changed so much from Friday.

If you were watching the forecast last week, we were expecting highs below 0 C pretty much all of this week starting Tuesday or Wednesday.

There were some models projecting highs in the -10 C to -12 C range, but I had been saying daytime highs in the -2 C to -8 C range seemed the most likely scenario.

So, what happened? There was a deep upper low that was projected to be sitting over the eastern prairies by early to mid week with an upper ridge to the west of us.

So, most of the modelling was expecting Alberta to be stuck in a really chilly northerly flow. There was always some question about just HOW cold, and I kept saying we "probably won't have a good handle on that until Monday."

Well...here we are on Monday and the upper low now looks like it'll develop a LOT further east (more like Hudson Bay area instead of the Saskatchean-Manitoba border).

AND...that's going to allow the upper ridge and that warmer air to the west to sneak in.

There's a surface low-pressure system that'll slide across the north and we'll briefly get into some "colder" air Wednesday.

But, on the whole, it'll be a mild week for late November.

 

Here's the forecast for Edmonton and area:

Today - Mainly sunny.

High: 4

 

Tonight - A few clouds.

9pm: -2

 

Tuesday - Partly cloudy in the morning. Mostly cloudy in the afternoon.

Morning Low: -4

Afternoon High: 7

 

Wednesday - Mostly cloudy. 40% chance of flurries or light snow in the afternoon & evening.

Morning Low: -7

Afternoon High: -2

 

Thursday - Mix of sun & cloud.

Morning Low: -4

Afternoon High: 2

 

Friday - Mostly cloudy. 30% chance of showers or rain/snow mix.

Morning Low: -4

Afternoon High: 5

 

Saturday - Mostly cloudy. 30% chance of evening flurries.

Morning Low: -5

Afternoon High: 3