Awesome April weather ahead!

Awesome April weather ahead

If you like sunshine and warming temperatures, you'll love this week's forecast.

SEATTLE - A chilly start with clear skies this morning, but big changes are ahead for Western Washington with our first big warm up of 2021. 

Today we’ll end up near 60 around Puget Sound. Normal high temp for this part of April has ticked up to 58 degrees. But, thanks to high pressure sitting over the region we'll see a warming offshore wind coming down out of the mountains.

This will help to send our temps into the 70s for the first time this year. I don't think it'll just be one day, but several days in the 70s in a row. Not quite record high temps though. Those tend to be in the 80s for this week historically. Our last day of 70+ temps at Sea-Tac Airport was early October of last year. 

The high pressure ridge will also hold off rain for quite some time. Today will be day #2 of a dry streak that looks to last about 7 or 8 total -- and will be the longest dry streak of 2021. The previously longest dry streak was 6 days in early March.

In the meantime, spring allergy sufferers could have a tough go of it this week. Mild temps and warm breezes will send tree pollen counts soaring and they'll build over this week in the atmosphere without the rain to clean the air. Folks with tree pollen sensitivities should consider keeping their windows closed, especially in the morning hours when the pollen levels can be the highest of the day near the ground. -Tim Joyce

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