City Forecast Discussion: Providence, RI

The second city of the national forecast contest took us to the capital of the smallest state in the United States, Rhode Island.  Providence was a great and unique experience as all forecast cities have been so far.  The precise spot that was forecast for in Providence was at T. F. Green State Airport which The Rolling Stones were arrested at in 1972.  That was a little history for you.  Now back to the challenges in forecasting for it.  One of the biggest influences was the direction of wind.  If the winds came from a westerly or northerly direction it heated or cooled with respect to the rest of the land.  However, if the winds came from the south or east then the temperature was influence by the temperature of either the Greenwich Bay to the south or the Providence River/Narragansett Bay.  Both bodies of water had a temperature ranging from 40 to 45 degrees Fahrenheit.  This would keep the airport cool during the days and warm at night if winds were strong enough.  Also, the winds had a tendency to be strong at times due to them being next to the bays because of less friction on the wind than winds coming from Connecticut or Massachusetts.

Clouds always play a factor in any cities high and low and even wind as the fewer the clouds the warmer it gets and the stronger the winds can be if the land is much warmer than the bays.  The more clouds the less the temperature could warm and the calmer the winds are since average temperature over land is close to the body of water.  If a front comes through with really cold air behind it that's a different story, you will have stronger winds there because of temperature differences.  Storms normally come from the southeast about this time of the year, but in a whole year they can come from the southeast, west, and even from the east.  This year has been warmer than normal for a lot of places which allowed for more rain than snow this year.  Providence was effected by this, but still got some snow and snow really makes forecasting for a high and low difficult due to various warming and cooling processes it can do.  Forecasting snowfall amounts is always a challenge because it really depends on how much melting occurs or how cold it is.

Now that Providence is done the forecast contest has moved to another city which is far more challenging than Providence due to a number of local effects, but the biggest one of them all is mountains.  This city's nickname is The Duke City, known world wide for its International Balloon Fiesta, and is the largest city of one of the states of the Four Corners.