Marine Weather and Tide Forecast for Grundy, VA

KEY MESSAGES
- 1) A strong cold front is expected on Saturday into Sunday.

- 2) Fire weather threat will be possible for the new work week.

- 3) Cooler and drier to start next week with frost and freeze potential.

DISCUSSION
KEY MESSAGE 1...

A strong cold front is expected to sweep through this Saturday while exiting by late Sunday morning. This feature will bring a nice wetting rain to the area suppressing fire danger for now along with the potential for severe thunderstorm activity. SPC has us under a slight risk for much of the area. This feature will enter the area with not much instability to work with due to cloud coverage and timing of a later entry to the area along with post frontal rain activity. What it does have is modest to strong wind shear along with the potential for hail as freezing levels will be on the lower side of things as cold air advection is strong with this one. Another potential hazard will be tornadoes since there will be a lot of helicity to work with which will help potential spin ups along the frontal boundary.

With the exit of this feature, cold air behind the front will advect in promoting lower than normal temperatures for Sunday with post frontal showers lingering across the area through Sunday evening. Lingering rain chances may even turn into snow for the highest peaks and ridges along the northeast mountains Sunday evening.

KEY MESSAGE 2...

A fire weather threat will potentially be a concern for the new work week on a daily basis as RH values plummet every afternoon with elevated wind on a daily basis as well. A few disturbances will ride by the area, hopefully providing some relief to suppress fire danger in certain areas, however these disturbances look very minor and much of the area will likely not receive any rainfall. Therefore, there will be a slight chance of rain daily from Tuesday going into the weekend, however once again, this may not be enough to damper the fire threat concerns. This will have to be closely monitored on a daily basis to see if any headlines or special weather statements will be needed.

KEY MESSAGE 3...

For Monday morning, frost and freeze will be possible as the colder air mass settles in overhead. There is even a little chance for snow to get into the mountains as lingering precipitation changes from rain to snow in the highest elevations of the peaks and ridges of the northeast mountains Sunday evening as cold air settles in as previously mentioned.

The highest elevations are forecast to be freezing while the rest of the area, excluding the parts of southeast Ohio who may be freezing or below, will be just above freezing allowing for frost to develop. There will be wind overnight, but may not be enough to suppress frost development.

Tuesday will be another morning with the potential for frost and freeze headlines. The northeast mountains will be below freezing once again and the rest of the area excluding parts of the southern coal fields will be just above freezing to allow for the potential for frost to develop, especially under weak surface flow.

By Tuesday afternoon, the area will warm back up to above seasonable and the start of a warming trend will commence going into Friday deterring the frost or freeze potential.

AVIATION /06Z FRIDAY THROUGH TUESDAY/
The potential for fog is growing this morning as valley fog spreads across the southern coal fields and into BKW. This post rain fog may get into CKB/EKN as well since they had rain previously. Have coded up fog at these terminals as well as some patchy light fog at CRW/HTS. Depending on if the winds decouple at these sites will gauge how much fog they actually get. The confidence is medium since the fog has started already but has not gotten into the northern sites just yet. After the morning fog lifts and VFR conditions will return to a pleasant and partly cloudy day with just some mid to high clouds passing through.

FORECAST CONFIDENCE AND ALTERNATE SCENARIOS THROUGH 06Z SATURDAY...

FORECAST CONFIDENCE: Medium.

ALTERNATE SCENARIOS: More widespread MVFR stratus or areas of fog may form than forecast.

EXPERIMENTAL TABLE OF FLIGHT CATEGORY OBJECTIVELY SHOWS CONSISTENCY OF WFO FORECAST TO AVAILABLE MODEL INFORMATION: H = HIGH: TAF CONSISTENT WITH ALL MODELS OR ALL BUT ONE MODEL.
M = MEDIUM: TAF HAS VARYING LEVEL OF CONSISTENCY WITH MODELS.
L = LOW: TAF INCONSISTENT WITH ALL MODELS OR ALL BUT ONE MODEL.

DATE FRI 04/17/26 UTC 1HRLY 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 EDT 1HRLY 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 CRW CONSISTENCY H H H H H H H H H H H H HTS CONSISTENCY H H H H H H H H H H H H BKW CONSISTENCY H H H H H H H H H H H H EKN CONSISTENCY H M M L L M M H H H H H PKB CONSISTENCY H H H H H H H H H H H H CKB CONSISTENCY H M M L L M M H H H H H

AFTER 06Z SATURDAY...
Brief periods of MVFR to IFR restrictions are possible within showers and thunderstorms late Saturday into Saturday night.

RLX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES
WV...None.
OH...None.
KY...None.
VA...None.