WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON: Mix of sun & clouds, humid and warm with isolated T’shower. Highs: 82 to 86 inland, 78 to 82 beaches. South to southwest wind 10 to 15 mph.

WEDNESDAY NIGHT:   Variably cloudy warm and muggy with a spotty shower along the coast. Lows: 68 to 72 inland, 70 to 74 beaches.  South wind 5 to 10 mph.

THURSDAY: Variably cloudy, warm and humid. Scattered t’storms that can produce brief heavy downpours . Highs: 78 to 82 inland, 74 to 78 beaches. Southwest wind 10 to 20 mph.

DISCUSSION:  Today looks to be the warmest we’ll see for at least the next week. More sun than clouds for the afternoon. We will however see more scattered thundershowers develop from southeast to northwest as the sea breeze tracks inland. But I expect less coverage of these showers than we have seen in recent days.

The heat and humidity of the last week will finally get pushed off the coast by the cold front that has been responsible for the deadly tornadoes in the Mid West earlier this week. As the front gets close to us on Thursday, another round of afternoon storms will develop. The main threat from these storms for us will be more heavy downpours like we’ve seen most of this week.

The front will reach the coast by Friday morning taking most of the moisture with it. However, the upper level pocket of cold air will still be tracking over eastern Carolina Friday afternoon. This means that the clouds will be slow to clear and we could even see some isolated t’showers.

The holiday weekend will feature a big change from the summer-like conditions we’ve seen all week. Behind the cold front will be a refreshing Canadian high pressure. This will bring slightly below normal temperatures in the 70s and more importantly much less humidity.

---LES STILL