20 August, 2017
Most of the nation should see fairly quiet weather Monday for the Great American Eclipse, the National Weather Service said. Viewing should be good in Nashville, Chattanooga and St. Louis, as well as in Portland.
We are less than three days away from a total solar eclipse that has captivated the entire country.
Travelers heading toward the Missouri Bootheel may have more success to see the eclipse without cloud cover, he said. People in parts of Kentucky and southern IL can also expect to have nice weather.
Elsewhere, hit-or-miss clouds are likely.
An overcast sky would mean that viewers on the ground would only see darkening conditions while the eclipse itself would be obscured by the clouds but this is an unlikely scenario. "It's something to keep in mind".
WYFF meteorologists John Cessarich and Chris Justus also say that because the models use historical data, the models can not account for the expected 10 to 15-degree drop in temperature that will happen during the total eclipse.
Musher added to Time: 'The Midwest is kind of in the unknown'.
But Musher predicts "unfavorable" heavier cloud cover in the Southeast, particularly in North Carolina and SC, which could hinder eclipse viewing, though northern Georgia should be alright. It should also be OK in northern Georgia and the western part of SC.
"It's a crapshoot at this point", said Jim Gandy, chief meteorologist at WLTX, a local TV station in Columbia, S.C. The best predictions from computer models won't come until late Sunday, he said. "Later in the afternoon, there could be thunderstorms developing".
On eclipse day, the forecast calls for sunny skies with a high near 86.
The cloud cover will be affected by a frontal boundary that will get pushed south through the area over the weekend, but that is expected to lift back toward the north, bringing the cloud cover with it.
