What to expect during the busiest travel week of the year

AccuWeather

On today's Forecast Feed, Bernie Rayno breaks down what travelers can expect as Thanksgiving week approaches

Transcript

00:00And the busiest travel week of the year is coming up on Thanksgiving week. We're about two weeks

00:06away, but here on the feed, we're already looking forward to that week. I want to give everybody an

00:12idea of what to expect. Have some headlines here for the Thanksgiving day week for the entire,

00:18it's a stormier pattern. Now, do we have one big storm or a couple of storms? Either of those

00:25scenarios are possible. I'll show you why coming up here using some of the tools that I use on

00:29daily basis to make the forecast here. We're also looking at the snow. If we do see snow,

00:35I think it's going to be in the upper Midwest and the Northern Lakes, not so much in the Northeast.

00:40It's the upper Midwest where I think there's going to be a threat of that on Thanksgiving week.

00:45Meanwhile, it could turn wet from the Central Gulf Coast states to perhaps the Carolinas

00:49with the possibility of showers and thunderstorms. Now, those are kind of the highlights. Let me show

00:55you where we're going with Thanksgiving week. I want to start with this. This is Monday,

01:01Monday, November 24th. Now, this is the European model. You'll see some big differences in the

01:07models as I show you the European model and the American model. This is the European model. What

01:12this is showing you is a bigger storm. Look what's going on here. You have a slow moving upper low. This

01:17is Monday across the upper Midwest and watch how it moves as we head into Tuesday evening. What will

01:23end up happening? One piece will go here. One will come down here. This keeps much of the Southeast

01:29and the Central, well, let's East Coast somewhat unsettled, at least as we get into Tuesday and

01:35Wednesday. Now, if this would be right, I think this would clear out. And then a lot of the country

01:42would be kind of quiet Wednesday and Thursday, right? Or as we get into Thanksgiving day, the day

01:49before Thanksgiving, Wednesday, and then Thanksgiving day would be more of a quiet day. That's what the

01:54European model suggests. A little different, though, on the American model. And this is where

01:59long-range forecasting get a little tricky. So here is the European. Watch the American model. This is

02:06Monday. A little different here. So instead of an upper low closed up, the American model says, no,

02:12you've got a fast-moving storm here that's going to produce some precipitation in the Northeast.

02:18That goes by. And then you have another storm across the central part of the United States.

02:23This would probably produce snow across the upper lakes. And then you have a third system

02:29coming into the West Coast on Thursday. You see that? So Wednesday, you may have some travel delays

02:35across New England. There'll be some gusty winds along the eastern seaboard. And then another storm

02:39would drop in across the Intermountain West and eventually in the plains Wednesday and Thursday.

02:45So the European has one big storm. The American model has three big storms. So where do you go

02:52from here? It's a big difference here as you look at this. So again, let's go back. European one big

02:57storm. The GFS one, two, and three, right? All right. But at this point, I've got to make a forecast

03:04for you. Here's what I think we're going to do. I don't think the Europeans quite right with this,

03:09that you have one big, slow-moving storm, right? I think it will be segmented a little bit into

03:15multiple storms. And I'm not sure the GFS is right in that this storm, instead of being like this,

03:22maybe it's not like this, but it's somewhere in between. And I do think there will be another

03:26storm coming into the West Coast as we get into Tuesday and Wednesday. So I'm going to take a

03:31compromise here. So here's the compromise for Thanksgiving week here. What I've done is,

03:36I can't say anywhere with a definitive statement that travel is going to be good.

03:43But let's talk a storm track here from the West to the Midwest to the Northeast. So there could be

03:49quite a few travel delays in this area as we head into Thanksgiving Day week, especially now. I may

03:56take this down into the Southeast as well. So it's a little in flux for Thanksgiving week,

04:02but I think there's at least going to be some delays to talk about as we close in

04:08on Thanksgiving. And that's the feed.

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