A severe weather event is expected to unfold on Sunday with damaging winds and tornadoes likely in portions of the Northeast and Mid Atlantic. The National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center (SPC)Â has identified portions of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and all of Delaware as a risk zone for tornadoes; the same is true for far northern New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. There is also an elevated threat of damaging wind gusts across all of New Jersey and Delaware, most of Maryland, and portions of New York, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Virginia.
According to the SPC, broad troughing will exist across the eastern United States on Sunday with several smaller-scale troughs moving through a longer-wave trough. During the morning, one shortwave trough will be moving across the Northeast and a secondary low amplitude trough is forecast to move through the eastern states later in the day. As this happens, low-mid-level southwesterly flow will increase, providing effective-layer shear sufficient for thunderstorm organization. Multiple rounds of thunderstorms will be possible along and ahead of the surface front during the afternoon and evening.
The SPC says that damaging wind gusts will be the main concern with these storms, with the greatest threat in portions of the Mid Atlantic. The SPC also believes isolated tornadoes are possible too.
Additional bands or clusters of storms are likely to develop during the afternoon across portions of the Upper Ohio Valley into Pennsylvania and New York. While instability will be lower across this area, deep-layer flow will be stronger, providing an atmosphere ripe for severe and damaging wind gusts through the evening.
Most of the most severe storms will develop and impact areas between 3-11 pm. After that, the threat of severe weather will diminish quickly as the airmass stabilizes during the overnight hours.
