978
FXUS63 KJKL 092308
AFDJKL

AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
National Weather Service Jackson KY
708 PM EDT Thu Oct 9 2025

.KEY MESSAGES...

- Tonight will be the coldest night of the week. A patch or two
  of frost cannot be ruled out in some of the coldest northern
  hollows.

- Otherwise, a dry and seasonable autumn weather pattern with
  mostly sunny days and mainly clear nights is expected to
  continue through the weekend and into next week.

- Temperatures will slowly warm back to slightly above normal by
  early next week.

&&

.UPDATE...
Issued at 705 PM EDT THU OCT 9 2025

The forecast is on track, with just minor updates to the hourly T/Td
grids with the early evening update.

&&

.SHORT TERM...(This evening through Friday night)
Issued at 246 PM EDT THU OCT 9 2025

An autumn chill is in the air this afternoon. Skies are sunny,
but temperatures are only in the 60s to near 70. A cool
northeasterly breeze is noted at ~5 to 10 mph, continuing to feed
dry and cool air across the Eastern Kentucky Coalfields. The fair
but cool weather is courtesy of an ~1035 mb surface high centered
over Lake Ontario. Looking aloft, broad ridging remains in place
over the Central CONUS (a weak embedded disturbance is passing
through the ridge and now over northern Alabama but will have no
sensible impact on our weather in the short-term). A much more
potent northern stream 500 hPa vorticity maximum is diving
southeast across Manitoba.

The aforementioned energy from the vorticity maximum will dive
southeast and begin to form a closed 500 hPa low over the Great
Lakes by early Saturday morning, while the remnant southern stream
energy drifts over Georgia. This approaching upper-level system
will lead to weak height falls over eastern Kentucky, particularly
on Friday and Friday night, as the surface high drifts off into
the North Atlantic. As that system consolidates over the Great
Lakes, its associated surface cold front will sag southeastward
toward the Lower Ohio Valley by late Friday night, but substantive
moisture will remain to our south with the aforementioned weak
southern energy. While 850 mb temperatures will vary minimally,
the driest air mass will be in place over the area tonight, and
this should allow for the strongest radiational cooling and
coldest night of the next 7 days. A patch or two of frost cannot
be completely ruled out in the coldest hollows. Supporting this,
09/12z GFS Co-Op MOS guidance for locations like Sandy Hook and
West Liberty suggests lows could reach ~37F by early Friday
morning. Gradual moisture recovery will occur on a weak southerly
return flow ahead of the front on Friday into Friday night, which
will keep Friday night`s temperatures slightly warmer.

In terms of sensible weather, the seasonable autumn airmass will
bring mild, sunny afternoons and chilly nights/mornings through
the short-term. Fog formation is favored each night, primarily in
the mainstem river valleys and along larger tributaries. The
coldest morning of the entire forecast is ahead tonight with
widespread lows in the upper 30s to mid 40s. Some of the very
coldest hollows, such as those near West Liberty and Sandy Hook,
could approach the mid-30s. On Friday, fair conditions continue
with high temperatures forecast to range in the lower to middle
70s. Slightly warmer lows, ranging through the 40s, can be
expected on Friday night, though the warmest thermal belt ridges
may bottom out near 50F. Normal high temperatures for this time
of year range from 69F over the northern foothills to 74F near
Lake Cumberland, while normal nighttime lows range from 51F on
thermal belt ridges to 43F in the coldest sheltered northern
hollows.

.LONG TERM...(Saturday through Thursday)
Issued at 220 PM EDT THU OCT 9 2025

The global ensemble model system is in overall good agreement in
a significant coastal storm impacting the Mid-Atlantic this
weekend, with upper ridging extending north over the central part
of the country from a closed high in the vicinity of Texas
thereafter. This leaves our region in primarily dry northwesterly
flow aloft this weekend through the middle of next week. It
should be noted that the operational GFS model continues to be a
notable outlier in bringing an active west-northwesterly jet
stream with return southwesterly surface flow and much milder and
wetter conditions at the end of the period (i.e., the middle of
next week).

Clear to partly cloudy skies are expected through the duration of
the extended from Saturday through Wednesday night, with gradually
warming highs through the 70s and lows gradually warming through the
40s and lower 50s each successive night. Some uncertainties begin to
creep into the temperature forecast as the NBM probabilistic
envelope shows an inflection point back downward beginning around
Wednesday of next week, which seems to be indicative of a dry cold
frontal passage around that time.

&&

.AVIATION...(For the 00Z TAFS through 00Z Friday evening)
ISSUED AT 707 PM EDT THU OCT 9 2025

VFR conditions prevail across all TAF sites at 00z as high
pressure remains firmly in control of our weather. VFR conditions
will continue through the TAF period outside of limited fog in
the sheltered river valleys tonight. Winds will be northeasterly
at 4 to 7 kts this evening, then weaken and gradually veer to a
southerly direction at less than 5 kts by Friday afternoon.


&&

.JKL WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
None.

&&

$$

UPDATE...CMC
SHORT TERM...GEERTSON
LONG TERM...CMC
AVIATION...CMC