Hello, everyone! Jared Smith here with your Charleston weather forecast for Thursday, January 4th, 2024.

After a little rain on Wednesday night, we dry out and clear up for Thursday.

We’ll start in the upper 30s, and we’ll expect temperatures to head just to the mid-50s in the afternoon despite full sunshine.

These highs will be courtesy of a persistent northerly breeze that could gust to about 20 mph at times, so keep that in mind if you’re thinking about an outdoor lunch.

It just might be too chilly for that.

We’ll stay cool heading into Friday.

We start the day flirting with a freezing mark once again, warming back to the mid-50s in the afternoon.

Clouds will be increasing ahead of a developing storm system, and we can expect rain to return to the area roughly after midnight or so.

However, we get the vast majority of, if not all of, Friday in rain-free.

Saturday is going to be an outlier in the temperature department.

We expect to start the day in the mid-40s, likely with rain in the area, before warming to the upper 60s for what could be a fairly brief time in the afternoon after a warm front lifts north of the area.

Showers and a few thunderstorms look to continue into early afternoon before departing by Saturday evening, at least based on the current timing, so stay tuned for tweaks.

And it’ll be a bit breezy as well, especially ahead of the front.

And as for rainfall, we can expect about an inch or so in most locations with locally heavier amounts.

High pressure builds back in on Sunday, and we can expect partly to mostly cloudy skies with lows in the low 40s and highs around 60 degrees right at normal for early January.

High pressure hangs around into Monday before giving way to what could be a fairly potent storm system that’ll affect the area on Tuesday.

Now model guidance has been hitting on sprawling low pressure developing across the Midwest, with its effects being felt across the eastern half of the continental US Tuesday into Wednesday.

For our part, it looks like a warm front lifts north of the area later Monday into early Tuesday, followed by a strong cold front Tuesday afternoon into the evening.

While it’s early to pinpoint specifics about what’ll happen, chances are good that we’re going to see periods of heavy rain as well as some strong winds thanks to what should be a tight pressure gradient developing across the area.

What’s less clear is the risk for any severe weather.

While the dynamics look quite favorable, instability is always the question in the cool season, as well as the potential for coastal flooding given onshore winds and an approaching new moon.

So stay tuned to forecast updates as Tuesday gets closer, and we can fine-tune some of these details and really understand what we’re dealing with.

And that was Charleston Weather Daily for January 4th, 2024.

I’m Jared Smith.

Visit chswx.com anytime for your latest Charleston weather conditions, alerts, and forecast updates.

Thanks for listening, and I’ll talk to you tomorrow.