Forecast Last Updated at Thursday, September 4, 2008 at 7:55PM

Hanna Well to our East

Temperatures today were on the pleasantly warm side courtesy of lots of sunshine. Expect a mostly clear overnight with patchy fog developing once again in the valleys. Clouds from Hanna will arrive Friday, but showers will be at night and mostly limited to the extreme east (near the Blue Ridge). Showers may linger into Saturday morning, but the sun will reappear by afternoon. We will have the slight chance of a thundershower Saturday afternoon. Sunday and Monday, dry weather returns.

The winning photos in the 2009 RWC Calendar Contest have been named. Thanks to everyone for 870 entries this year. Calendars should be available for sale by October 1.

Two community events will benefit from Hanna exiting early Saturday: Daniel Boone Days and the High Country Bluegrass Festival. See our hourly forecast for both events.

Thursday Hi: 68 Lo: 54 Mainly clear overnight; Patchy fog developing; SSE wind 5-15 mph

Friday Hi: 67 Lo: 57 Increasing clouds; Chance of showers at night; East wind 5-15 mph

Saturday Hi: 67 Lo: 56 Morning clouds with the chance of a shower; Some afternoon sun with the slight chance of a t-shower; North wind 10-20 mph, gusty in the AM

Sunday Hi: 68 Lo: 53 Scattered clouds; Pleasant

Monday Hi: 67 Lo: 54 Partly cloudy; Pleasant

Further Out

Tuesday - Mostly cloudy; Scattered PM t-shower; High in the mid 60s; Low in the mid 50s
Wednesday - Scattered clouds; Slight chance of an afternoon t-shower; High in the mid 60s; Low in the lower 50s

Forecast Discussion

Again today, we'll start with the tropics...
Gustav's leftovers are still producing lots of rain in the upper Mississippi Valley. It's remnant low will move into IL this evening and be in SE Canada by Friday evening.
Hanna is the upcoming issue. It is a tropical storm beginning to clear the central Bahamas and heading NW. Hanna will head toward the SC Coast, arriving late Friday or Friday night probably as a Category 1 hurricane. Saturday it will move through East Carolina and into Eastern VA by Saturday evening.
Ike remains a Category 4 hurricane located about 500 miles NNE of the Leeward Islands. It will move west and be in the Bahamas by Sunday and possibly be a threat to the East Coast Tuesday through Thursday of next week.
Josephine is way out there in the Atlantic moving WNW. It won't be an issue for another week if at all.

So what does all this mean for our weather?
Tonight, expect mainly clear skies with more patchy valley fog developing.
Friday clouds will increase but showers from Hanna will hold off until Friday night. We will only get a brief swipe from Hanna rains being on the western extreme of the rain shield. Showers may last into Saturday morning. Any rain from Hanna will be light and mostly limited to the eastern edge of the Appalachians (the Blue Ridge). As Hanna exits into Virginia Saturday, a trough associated with the remnants of Gustav will move across our area that could spark an afternoon thundershower.
Sunday and Monday look dry as high pressure builds back in.
Tuesday, a front from the NW will roll into the area bringing the chance for afternoon thundershowers.
Wednesday will depend on the location of Ike. If Ike is near the Fla coast, then the front will get hung up and give us a continued chance of a thundershower. If Ike is still in the Bahamas, then the front will slide to our east and drier air will roll in.

Sugar Mountain Resort Activities

Mark your calendar for Sugar's 18th annual Oktoberfest Saturday & Sunday, October 11-12, 2008. Just a plain "ole" good time for the whole family! www.skisugar.com/Oktoberfest. Handmade arts and crafts vendors now being accepted.

Hiking and biking trails intertwine throughout the Village of Sugar Mountain. Trail access is free of charge May through October during daylight hours. Trail maps are located in a black, marked mailbox at the base of the Flying Mile slope. Trails are constantly being maintained so please be cautious. Also keep in mind that weather and other variables can change the condition of any trail. While riding a bike within the Village limits helmets are required.

Reduced rates on Sugar Mountain Resort season passes are now available until October 14th.

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--Roaring Gap 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.