Marine Weather and Tide Forecast for Fuquay-Varina, NC

NEAR TERM /TODAY AND TONIGHT/
As of 636 AM Tuesday...

Hot and humid conditions today with only a small chance of storms.

Areas of stratus and fog will be around through mid-morning.
Otherwise, expect the stratus and fog to burn off mid to late morning with partly sunny skies to follow. Most guidance with support from CAMS indicates widely scattered thunderstorms this afternoon into the early evening. Dew points and low level moisture will remain very high with readings in the lower to mid 70s. These readings along with highs in the upper 80s to lower 90s will feel like mid 90s to near 100. A SW breeze around 10 mph will help for some slight relief. Lows tonight will be mainly in the lower to mid 70s.

SHORT TERM /WEDNESDAY AND WEDNESDAY NIGHT/
As of 302 AM Tuesday...

Hotter and still very humid, only isolated thunderstorms

After a bit of stratus and fog, mostly sunny and hot conditions are expected Wednesday. Only isolated PM thunderstorms are forecast given the strong upper ridging and drier air aloft. Unfortunately, the drier air does not translate to the surface as dew points remain very high.
Expect lower to mid 70s dew points with highs 90-95 NW to central and SE.
SW winds will pick up during the afternoon making it a bit more tolerable at 15-20 mph. Expect mainly clear skies Wednesday night with lows in the lower to mid 70s.

LONG TERM /THURSDAY THROUGH MONDAY/
As of 346 AM Tuesday...

Thursday through Friday: A potent short-wave will eject across the Ohio Valley and Mid-Atlantic region Thursday into Friday. At the sfc, a cold front will push across central NC Thursday night into Friday morning. Ahead of the front, anomalous moisture will persist (PWAT ~1.75 to 2 inches) while temperatures rise into the mid 90s. While the stronger upper forcing will remain well to our north, scattered showers and storms are likely to roll off the high terrain and/or develop along a lee sfc trough centered across central NC. These showers and storms will move west to east across central NC before diminishing Thursday night. Shear profiles amongst ensembles have shifted some of the stronger shear further south into our northern tier of counties, albeit still marginal at best (~25 to 30 kts). As such, a few stronger to severe storms will be possible Thursday afternoon and evening. As of now, forecast soundings indicate a largely damaging wind gust threat (uni-directional shear with DCAPE of ~1000 J/kg). The CSU ML severe outlook model also highlights damaging wind gusts as the main possible hazard Thursday and primarily for areas north of Raleigh. SPC’s latest Day 3 update this morning concurs with our thinking, adding a slight risk for much of our CWA and mentioning primarily a wind and hail threat.

The cold front will clear central NC by Friday morning and stall along the coast. Ensembles suggest that anomalous PWAT (~1.75 inches)
will persist in our southeastern areas for much of Friday. As such, sea breeze/frontal convection could drift into our southern areas Friday afternoon and early evening. Any lingering convection will diminish quickly Friday night as we finally start to see some drier air trickle in as PWAT drops into the 1.25 to 1.5 inch range Friday night. Highs on Friday will peak in the upper 80s to lower 90s.

Saturday through Monday: The rest of the extended period will feature highly anomalous ridging along the eastern seaboard (center of the ridge over the Mid-Atlantic reaches geopotential heights 4 standard deviations above normal by Monday night). With this type of setup, expect temperatures to soar into the mid 90s Saturday, and upper 90s by Sunday and especially on Monday.
There’s a good chance heat indices will near or exceed Heat Advisory criteria. The experimental HeatRisk product suggests the “extreme” category could be reached across much of the Piedmont, Sandhills, and Coastal Plain as well on Monday. Make sure to stay hydrated and practice heat safety (weather.gov/safety/heat) especially if spending a considerable amount of time outside this weekend and early next week. With the ridge centered over us, rain chances should be fairly limited during this period.

AVIATION /12Z TUESDAY THROUGH SATURDAY/
As of 636 AM Tuesday...

MVFR to IFR cigs will linger through 13z-15z, with improvement to VFR expected by 15z to 17z. Only isolated showers and storms are expected during the afternoon into the evening with generally VFR conditions.
Best chance of MVFR conditions with a brief thunderstorm will be around KINT between 21z/17 and possibly 01z/18 or so.

Looking beyond 12z Wednesday, there is a chance of sub-VFR conditions early Wednesday morning. While isolated storms may occur Wednesday afternoon, the next best chance of thunderstorms will be late Thursday afternoon through Thursday night, when some storms could become strong.
Otherwise, chances for afternoon/evening storms will be minimal.

EQUIPMENT
Computer System Upgrade at NWS Raleigh from June 16th through 18th...

The National Weather Service Raleigh Weather Forecast Office in Raleigh will be conducting a required, scheduled update to our Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System (AWIPS) computer system. NWS offices use AWIPS to display and integrate weather and water information, and to send life-saving information, such as weather and water warnings, to the public.

AWIPS is updated periodically, but this update is comprehensive and requires that the system be taken completely offline for approximately three days, from the morning of Monday, June 16th through the afternoon hours of Wednesday, June 18th. During that time, NWS Raleigh forecasters will produce and disseminate products for the area using the AWIPS system at one of our backup offices at NWS Blacksburg, VA. No impacts to our core services of forecast products and weather watches, warnings and advisories are expected during this period.

A few of our services will be impacted as they originate only from AWIPS facilities at NWS Raleigh, namely:

* NOAA Weather Radio broadcast: The following NOAA Weather Radio transmitters, programmed by NWS Raleigh, will be off the air during most of the AWIPS update:

Buck Mountain (WWF 60 - 162.500 mhz)
Chapel Hill (WXL 58 - 162.550 mhz)
Ellerbe (WNG 597 - 162.400 mhz)
Garner (WNG 706 - 162.450 mhz)
Henderson (WNG 586 - 162.500 mhz)
Tarboro (WXL 59 - 162.475 mhz)
Winston-Salem (WXL 42 - 162.400 mhz)

* Graphical Hazardous Weather Outlook images normally at www.weather.gov/erh/ghwo?wfo=rah will not be updated.

* The Weather Story available at https:/ www.weather.gov/rah/weatherstory will not be updated.

* NWS Raleigh will remain operational and staffed while AWIPS is offline, taking public and partner phone calls, communicating via social media, and performing other functions that can be completed without AWIPS.

We apologize for any inconvenience. Please direct any questions to Jonathan Blaes at jonathan.blaes@noaa.gov

RAH WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES
None.