Marine Weather and Tide Forecast for Southport, NC

KEY MESSAGES
1) Particularly cold weather will be in place Saturday through Sunday night. A Cold Weather Advisory for wind chills 10-15 degrees is likely Saturday night into early Sunday morning.

DISCUSSION
KEY MESSAGE 1: Particularly cold weather will be in place Saturday through Sunday night. A Cold Weather Advisory for wind chills 10-15 degrees is likely Saturday night into early Sunday morning.

A series of cold fronts tonight and Saturday followed by Arctic high pressure Sunday will lead to dry, cold conditions through the weekend. A moisture starved cold front will push through tonight with a slight chance of showers for our northernmost areas this evening. This will be our first push of cold air which will be enhanced Saturday as a jet aloft with another surface cold front pushes off the NE coast, with us on the southern edge of it. These stronger winds aloft (~30-35 kts) should mix down during the daytime manifesting as wind gusts 30-40 mph. This paired with highs in the upper 30s-lower 40s will make Saturday afternoon wind chills around or below freezing (a -10 deg difference from the forecast highs).
This cold will continue into Saturday night where an overnight breeze will linger, dropping wind chills below 15 degrees to where a Cold Weather Advisory will likely be needed over a majority of the area, with some uncertainty for our westernmost counties. Arctic high pressure will then ridge over the area for Sunday with similar temperatures to Saturday but much less in the way of winds. There is some uncertainty around Sunday night where lows could end up several degrees cooler than currently forecast due to radiational cooling from calm winds and mostly clear skies. A Cold Weather Advisory should not be needed, and this will be the end of the cold weather as we warm up into early next week.

AVIATION /18Z FRIDAY THROUGH WEDNESDAY/
VFR through the period. Starting early Saturday morning we could see a wave of LLWS over all TAF sites as a jet moves overhead before we start to mix the higher winds down. The threat should decrease into Saturday afternoon where NW winds will gust 30-35 kts.

Extended Forecast...Ground fog could develop late Monday night, and sea fog could impact coastal terminals Monday night onwards.

MARINE
Through Saturday...A cold front will move through tonight with winds and seas increasing, gusts 25 kts and 6 footers ~20 nm out. A second front will push through Saturday with stronger NW winds gusting ~30 kts. A few, infrequent Gale Force gusts may be possible.

Saturday night through Wednesday...Gusty northerly winds Sat evening will begin to subside into Sunday as gradient relaxes.
Winds become lighter and a bit more variable into Monday as the center of high migrates nearly overhead. By late Mon into Tues, the high sinks south and east leaving a more SW return flow across the waters. Winds up to 30 kts Sat eve will drop to 5 to 10 kt by Sun aftn and remain light through Tues. Seas respond as well, with heights up to 4 to 6 ft Sat night dropping down to 2 to 4 ft on Sun leaving a longer period easterly swell Sun into Mon.

ILM WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES
NC...None.
SC...None.
MARINE...Small Craft Advisory from 10 PM this evening to 7 AM EST Sunday for AMZ250-252-254.
Small Craft Advisory from 6 PM this evening to 7 AM EST Sunday for AMZ256.