CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The state gets a welcomed weather change this week.
A cold front moved through early Monday bringing in drier air, according to National Weather Service Meteorologist Ray Young.
“We’re going to have drier weather in general for Tuesday and Wednesday. We can’t eliminate a few storms but we’re not expecting any flooding with them,” Young said. “Then on Thursday we get another cold front which kind of strange for July.”
The cold front will be a more calmer weather pattern but not lower temperatures, Young said.
“The heat will be continuing this week but we are getting rid of the heavy dumpers,” he said.
Those heavy dumpers have produced high water in an area stretching from the Mid-Ohio Valley through central counties to the northeastern mountains and into the eastern panhandle. There was also street flooding in Beckley last week.
Young said the storms of the past week were no slow-moving.
“We had a high pressure (system) sitting over us with a jet stream staying to our north and that basically allowed very little movement for any storms that formed. That kind of formed and then meandered very slowly,” Young said.
There’s thus far a significant variation in this month’s rain totals. Young said the heavy rain was very localized.
“Charleston airport, for example, only .73 above normal for the month but you have other places where they got a month’s worth of rainfall in one or two days. He’s highly localized and where they got it it caused a lot of problems,” Young said.