ROCHESTER, N.Y. – The latest update from the National Hurricane Center confirms that Hurricane Isaias is still a powerful category 3 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 115 mph and wind gusts up to 150 mph. It is expected to make landfall in the western Florida panhandle early Friday evening.
Western New York has been a bit windy Friday! The Rochester airport saw a peak gust of 29 mph today, while further west, the Buffalo airport saw a peak gust of 37 mph off Lake Erie. These gusts will really start to decrease through the evening as the sun sets. Winds will stay out of the west/southwest, but gusts will decrease below 10 mph with sustained winds between 3 and 8 mph. Calm conditions with only a few thin clouds will allow temperatures to drop into the low-40s, upper-30s for areas south of Rochester, while the metro area hovers around the mid-40s.
High, thin clouds will continue to increase into Saturday as high pressure over the mid-Atlantic stretches Isaias’s clouds up through the Appalachians and into the Northeast. Though Saturday may be cloudy at times, it should remain rain-free with temperatures in the upper-60s. A few places may even hit 70 degrees. Winds will stay more manageable out of the east/southeast between 5 and 10 mph. Clouds will continue to thicken into the evening and Saturday night which is expected to keep overnight lows in the low to mid 50s across the region.
Once Hurricane Isaias moves onshore, it will continue to weaken as it moves up the Tennessee Valley on Saturday. The remnants of this hurricane are very likely to bring us some steady rain on Sunday. This storm still has a lot of ground to cover once it crosses over the Gulf coast, so the estimated time of arrival for Sunday’s rain will fluctuate a bit over the next 24 hours. Current data shows that rain will likely make an appearance in the morning hours for southwestern New York, moving into Rochester during the mid to late morning hours and hanging around through the afternoon and early evening hours. Rainfall totals remain very modest. Western New York, in general, may see totals through Sunday between 0.25 and 0.75 inches of rain.
The post First Alert Weather: Winds decrease towards a calm and quiet Friday night; Tracking rain from Isaias on Sunday appeared first on WHEC.com.
