Downpours, severe storms may interfere with outdoor plans in East

Have outdoor activities or travel plans in store into Monday in the eastern United States? If so, get ready to dodge downpours and locally severe thunderstorms.

Into Monday, rain and thunderstorms advancing across the East will continue to interfere into some outdoor plans. Storms that persist into the start of the workweek can result in slower travel and perhaps create dangerous conditions in some locations, AccuWeather meteorologists warn.

A slow-moving storm is currently tapping into a growing zone of warm and moist air from the Appalachians to the Atlantic coast, leading to drenching showers and thunderstorms across the region. Some storms will even produce the possibility of localized severe weather and flash flooding.

Much of the Northeast had close to a week of dry weather since Debby unleashed torrential downpours that triggered flash flooding and rises on some of the region's rivers. That drying trend should prevent widespread problems on area river systems, though 1-2 inches and locally 3 inches of rain may fall this weekend.

"There can still be flash flooding of small streams and urban areas where it manages to pour for a couple of hours," AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Dan Pydynowski said, "but that sort of condition would tend to be highly localized."

Areas that sustained infrastructure damage to drainage systems and roadways during Debby's deluge may be most vulnerable to the quick runoff from this weekend's downpours.

The main reason that the Northeast did not experience widespread major river flooding from Debby was that intense rain fell in a narrow zone that affected mainly rural communities in the Appalachians rather than widespread heavy rainfall over the entire watershed of the large rivers, AccuWeather Senior Director of Forecasting Operations Dan DePodwin explained.

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Farther south, Debby was not so kind to the Carolinas and part of Georgia. This zone was swamped by torrential rainfall over a broad area encompassing many major river systems. Rivers in the lowlands continued to run at moderate to high flood levels, with some not forecast to crest until late in the weekend or later this week.

Even though the bulk of the rain will focus on the Northeast into Monday, enough downpours may occur along the Southeast coast to trigger flash urban and small stream flooding in some areas. As the rain runs off into the larger rivers, water levels may rise again in some locations but not to the extent that Debby triggered.

Meanwhile, those at the beaches may encounter less rain through the end of this weekend, but another problem may be present. AccuWeather meteorologists continue to warn of the risk of frequent and strong rip currents due to Hurricane Ernesto that continues to pull away from Bermuda this weekend and then Atlantic Canada over the upcoming days.

Severe thunderstorm threat exists into Monday

Some of the thunderstorms will get a bit feisty this weekend, especially during the afternoon and evening. A handful of the strongest storms will have the potential to produce a brief tornado.

Through Sunday evening, the risk of locally severe thunderstorms will tend to shift toward the I-95 zone and extend from portions of eastern Pennsylvania and New Jersey to much of Georgia, as well as northward into parts of Ontario and Quebec. Severe storms can also occur as far to the west as Arkansas and far southeastern Oklahoma.

Some of the most potent thunderstorms will pack wind gusts of 60-70 miles per hour with an AccuWeather Local StormMax™ gust of 75 mph.

On Monday, the risk of severe weather will be largely confined to the mid-Atlantic region.

As robust storms advance to the North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Delaware and New Jersey coastlines, they will once again bring the risk of flooding downpours, locally damaging winds and travel delays.

Cities like Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Richmond, Virginia, and Raleigh, North Carolina, will be within the corridor where potent storms can fire between Monday and Monday night. There can even be some pockets of severe thunderstorms even as far north as New England and eastern upstate New York.

By Tuesday, much of the Northeast will trend drier than what has been the theme the last few days. Forecasters say that there may be a few stubborn showers across portions of Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine on Tuesday, but a building zone of high pressure tracking eastward from the Great Lakes will promote dry conditions across the rest of the Northeast.

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