WINDING DOWN … and looking at the WXRISK Forecasts of the past week.

This event is winding down. Before we get to the details a couple of points. For those of you who are maintaining … “it was all a bunch of hype”…. Or…. “not much happened here” are several things to be said .

First far too many of you are either overanxious or just plain stupid when it comes to understanding weather forecasts. Let me give you an example.

SUPPOSE the forecast calls for 6 inches of snow in let’s say Charlottesville by 8:00 am. It isNOT OKAY for you — or anyone — to say that the forecast is wrong/ has busted / is underperformed at 6:00 PM n the the evening when the snow is just starting or before the heaviest snow has arrived.

I saw several people on the Facebook page today save things just like that — -except of course it had to do with rain. Look…. it IS perfectly okay to say that my forecast was wrong or the forecasts were wrong or Mr. Jones was wrong.

But it is not okay to say that the forecast is wrong or the system is underperformed before the main event begins. That is just plain ignorant.

To be sure you have the constitutional right to tell everybody that you are obtuse and ignorant. But I wouldn’t recommend it as a life strategy.

SECOND this may come as a shock to you but just because your particular location didn’t see much rain or wind doesn’t mean the ENTIRE forecast was a bust. That is the essence of being incredibly self-centered and obtuse which is a really bad way to go through the 21st century. Y es it is quite possible that for your location, the forecast did not work out. But that doesn’t mean for everybody it didn’t work out. Please have a little perspective.

THIRD my forecast has been since last week and the beginning of this past week was that this was going to be a coastal storm — a large wet slow moving windy Coastal storm which is exactly what happened.

PLEASE KEEP IN MIND WXRISK DID NOT ISSUE TROPICAL STORM WARNINGS !! That was done by NWS/ NHC and in my opinion it was an overreaction.

Even if this system was a tropical storm by the name of Ophelia. It formed very late and had a lot of non-tropical characteristics. The public would have been served just as well by going with Gale and Storm warnings as opposed to Tropical Storm warnings. The issuance of Tropical Storm warnings ALWAYS generates media sensationalism that is unnecessary.

I said the rain would begin first in eastern North Carolina and southeast Virginia and that it would end there first. That is exactly what happened.

I said that Southwest Virginia and western North Carolina would receive almost no rain — and again that is exactly what happened.

I said that there would be some rain of varying intensities in the Virginia and North Carolina Piedmont regions and that is exactly what has happened.

These first two images show Radars across the lower Middle Atlantic region from 7:00 pm. and at 10:45pm. What IS important to note here is that the core — The area highlighted in RED is holding together as it moves very slowly north. The rainfall amounts underneath this CORE as it moved three interior eastern North Carolina into the Richmond Metro area has been extreme but it is beginning to break down.

In addition at 7:00 p.m. Sunday, notice there were additional areas of moderate rain across northwest Virginia, the West Virginia Panhandle ,and in and around Greensboro North Carolina and Charlottesville Virginia. But there are also gaps in the rain shield.

These next images give information about what is going to happen during the overnight hours.

This image is the simulated radar at 1:00 am Sunday and the main CORE — again highlighted in RED — has lifted north of the Richmond Metro area and there is moderate to heavy rain in Stafford, Freddysburg, Manassas, southern Maryland. Lake Anna over to Charlottesville. Note that the rain areas in northwest Virginia and the southern Virginia Piedmont has ended.

ALL locations outside of the RED area will see very little additional rain.

At 4:00 am Sunday the CORE will be moving into northern Virginia and central Maryland impacting the Washington DC and Baltimore Metro areas as well as locations such as Culpeper, Warrenton, Leesburg, and the northern portions of the Shenandoah valley.

ALL locations outside of the RED area will see very little additional rain.

By 7:00 am the main area of rain is now just a large blob still impacting northern Virginia, central Maryland and is now pushed into central Pennsylvania. The rain is about over in Baltimore/ DC metro and the system is now weakening into just a large blob of rain.

By 10:00 a.m. most of the rain is now north of Washington and Baltimore and located north of Interstate 70 and in central Pennsylvania.

total additional rainfall expected over the next 18 hours can be seen here