Forecast Last Updated at Friday, November 21, 2008 at 8:20PM

Bone-Chilling Tonight; Milder Weekend

The second Arctic air mass this week is entrenched over the area leading to a very cold night. This reservoir of cold air will only slowly retreat over the weekend, perpetuating the unseasonably chilly weather.

The 2009 RWC Calendars are on sale now. Calendars are showing up in stores now. $2 from the sale of every calendar will go to the Hospitality House Combined Campaign.

Friday Hi: 37 Lo: 21 Clear skies and very cold overnight; NW wind diminishing to 5-10 mph

Saturday Hi: 46 Lo: 23 Sunshine, but with a few more afternoon clouds; Chilly; Light wind

Sunday Hi: 52 Lo: 30 Mostly clear; A bit milder; Light SW wind

Monday Hi: 52 Lo: 37 Mostly cloudy; A chance for rain during the second half of the day

Tuesday Hi: 46 Lo: 30 Partly cloudy; Turning colder and windy

Further Out

Wednesday - Scattered clouds; On the cool side; High in the lower 50s; Low near 30 degrees
Thursday - Mostly clear for Thanksgiving Day; More clouds arriving at night; High in the mid 50s; Low in the mid 30s

Forecast Discussion

Skies featured lots of sunshine today, but that did little to offset the very cold air that is firmly in place. After a very cold night, Saturday temperatures will at least be a little bit better, although some afternoon cloudiness may retard the temperature rise.

Sunday will be even milder, but still several degrees cooler than we should be for late-November. We are watching a cold front scheduled to push across the state Monday afternoon and evening. Some rain is likely along and ahead of the front Monday afternoon, followed by another push of colder air for Tuesday. Weekly temperatures will continue to average below normal.

Announcements

RaysWeather.Com continues to grow. We are an "information age" company using the web to broadcast the message but also as a tool for producing the message. RaysWeather.Com (what we call RWC) has evolved from "Ray's hobby in Beautiful Downtown Rutherwood" in 1999 to the most widely read media outlet in NW NC reaching 150,000 to 200,000 people per month and covering the weather from NC/VA line to Asheville and Wolf Laurel. We will continue to grow geographically as well--Burnsville and Waynesville were recently added; Black Mountain will be up and running very soon. The heart of the growth is good data, "local flavor", and THE most reliable forecast.

We recently added our 6th forecaster to the best forecast team ever assembled for this region. It's time for us to introduce "the crew"...

• Dr. Ray Russell is a Computer Science professor at Appalachian State University. His PhD is in Computer Science from Georgia Tech (1989); weather has been a long-time passion. He started posting a "snow forecast" on the university website back in the mid 1990's; this evolved into RaysWeather.Com in 2000. Ray lives in Boone and has taught at Appalachian State since 1991.
• Eric Anderson (RWC's Chief Meteorologist) received his degree in meteorology from the University of North Carolina at Asheville, and is a 15-year veteran of NOAA with experience in forecasting, observation and analysis. A native of western North Carolina, Eric's former tenure in the National Weather Service gave him the opportunity to forecast for areas of the Mid-Atlantic region. His professional interests include upslope flow snow events in the southern Appalachians, as well as cold air damming in the Carolinas.
• Alan Simons, born in Fayetteville NC, has a Bachelor of Science in meteorology and almost 20 years of professional experience that includes forecasting for newspapers, websites, radio, aviation, and the military. He first became interested in weather in North Carolina, and RWC takes him back home after a variety of duty stations, from New York to Hawaii. Alan's been with the RWC team since 2003.
• Tim Kirby joined Ray's Weather Center in October 2004 and lives in his hometown of Fries, VA (pronounced Freeze). The folks from this small Grayson County town say "it's freeze in winter and fries in summer". He has a Bachelor of Science degree in Meteorology from NC State University. While at NC State, he was president of the NCSU Student Chapter of the American Meteorological Society. Before joining RWC, Tim worked for the National Weather Service for ten years in Raleigh, Chattanooga and Morristown, Tennessee. Tim has always loved the challenge of forecasting and owes his dedication to a childhood fascination of snow (no school!).
• Harold Alston is a N.C. native with Bachelor of Science degrees from both App State (Broadcast Communications) and UNC-Asheville (Meteorology). He has 30 years experience tracking and forecasting NC weather including 15 years experience for media outlets. Nailing down Appalachian wedges & wintry possibilities are his areas of expertise with a lifetime of N.C. weather experiences to reference.
• Jeff Cox, a native of Asheville, is the latest addition to the RWC team. He earned a Bachelor of Sciences in Atmospheric Sciences from UNC-Asheville. At UNC-A, he was the lead forecaster for the school's Weather Forecast Line, campus Radio Station, "The Blue Echo" and the campus newspaper, "The Blue Banner." Jeff has experience as a meteorologist in both television and radio. He spent over 2 years in Macon, GA, as the chief meteorologist at WGXA FOX-24. He also has experience as a radio broadcast meteorologist for The Weather Channel in Atlanta, Georgia.