Heavy Rain in the Tennessee River Valley Today, Rain Moves into the Northeast by Tuesday

An "Omega Block" in the jet stream persists over the eastern third of the nation today.  This pattern in the jet stream is called an Omega Block since it resembles the Greek letter omega. It moves very slowly and it impedes the eastern progression of weather systems.  As a result, the weather will remain dry or wet for several days depending on where you are located.  It has been sunny and dry on the eastern side of the block beneath the ridge of high pressure, so it was sunny and pleasant for the past several days in the Northeast.  However, the storm that produced up to 18 inches of snow in Colorado with up to 15 inches in Minnesota continues to work its way slowly eastward.  It produced snow for the first time in May in Arkansas and baseball games were cancelled due to snow in Kansas City.  Very cold air with frost plunged into Oklahoma and northern Texas late last week.  The storm that produced the snow is dumping heavy rains with over 5 inches reported in parts of Florida, Georgia and Tennessee.  Some of this rain will move to the northeast by Tuesday as the Omega Block begins to weaken and move eastward.  Santa Ana winds produced brush fires and hot temperatures will readings soaring to near or above 90 in San Francisco and LA last week.  Low pressure and a weakening of the pressure gradient occurred Friday night and cooler weather moved into California on Saturday and today showers are forecast along the coast and across portions of north-central California.  
The GFS model is not forecasting any major outbreaks of cold air across the lower 48 states over the next 2 weeks with the only cold air moving into the Great Lakes and northern Plains on or about May 12th and into northern New England around May 15th.  
George Wright is a Certified Consulting Meteorologist for Wright Weather Consulting, LLC. George is also a meteorologist with ABC News and Cablevision News 12. Our website is WrightWeather.com.