Beautiful weekend for New England before unsettled weather next week

New England is in store for a mainly dry, warm weekend with low humidity. On Saturday, high pressure remains in control for New England. This high will sink to the south and east of New England today, bringing back a more southerly flow. This will push temperatures a notch warmer than Friday, however, very dry air aloft will aid in keeping humidity levels in check.

Heading into Sunday, a pair of frontal boundaries will be around. A weak cold front will drop into northern New England in the morning while a warm front lifts toward southern New England. Both of these fronts will only spark isolated showers Sunday morning.

Weather map for Sunday morning, showing the fronts, but also mainly dry weather:

Photo byWeather Prediction Center

The cold front will spark them across the northern tier while the warm front may send a couple quick showers into southern New England in the early morning, around or before sunrise. After the brief and isolated morning activity, the day Sunday will be very similar to Saturday with partly cloudy skies, warm temperature and continued lower humidity.

Early next week, the warm front will push northward and stall over New England. This will come as the ridge of high pressure over the Atlantic, which moved east and weakened slightly, will strengthen and push back west, closer to the east coast. This will keep Sunday’s frontal boundary around New England through much of next week. After one more very nice day on Monday, this will allow a stretch of unsettled weather to develop for the middle of next week.

Photo byNew England Storm Center

This setup will result in increased clouds along with shower and thunderstorm activity through much of next week. It won’t be a washout all day every day, but multiple rounds of showers and storms can be expected. A more organized system will likely move through New England at some point next week, bringing a more widespread, steady rainfall. As expected with a stalled frontal boundary, guidance is split on when it comes through, but we’re currently watching the Wednesday to Thursday time frame.

That ridge of high pressure over the Atlantic, which we went into more detail about in this article, will also help increase humidity levels again as it moves back toward the east coast, increasing the southerly flow. Starting on Sunday, each day will likely see humidity levels tick higher. This continues through midweek, when dew points may be back to the mid to upper 60s.

Photo byNew England Storm Center

As far as temperatures go, it will likely end up generally seasonable for New England. If anything, temperatures will have a better chance to end up on the cooler side due to the increased clouds and shower activity. As of now, Wednesday looks to have the best chance to be cooler than average.

The overall setup across the United States will see a trough sandwiched between a heat dome on the west coast and the Bermuda High in the Atlantic. This will keep the coolest temperatures, relative to local averages, across the center of the county and the hottest temperatures in the west.

Photo byNew England Storm Center

Looking further ahead, the frontal boundary looks to clear out by next weekend with ridging taking over. This will likely lead to a warming trend heading for next weekend, highlighted by the Climate Prediction Center's 8-14 day outlook (which currently covers July 27-August 2).

Photo byClimate Prediction Center