289 FXUS61 KBGM 291050 AFDBGM Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Binghamton NY 650 AM EDT Mon Jun 29 2026 .WHAT HAS CHANGED... No major changes to the upcoming forecast as model blends remain consistent from run to run. Continued to keep dew points a little lower than modeled for mid week, and lowered high temperatures slightly as well given potential cloud cover and pop up afternoon thunderstorms. && .KEY MESSAGES... 1) Heat and humidity will increase through this week leading to elevated heat index values. 2) Along with the heat and humidity, Tuesday through the end of the week could have daily isolated to scattered thunderstorms, some of which could be strong with a potential for localized torrential rainfall. && .DISCUSSION... KEY MESSAGE 1... A strong upper ridge is expected to build into the Eastern US this week, bringing a surge of hot temperatures and high moisture. Temperatures in the 90s and dewpoints from the upper 60s to mid-70s are exhibiting a high confidence of occurring. That's the easy part. The risk of exceeding heat thresholds is where the decisions become hazy. Baseline NBM blends continue to have a solid splatter of mid 70s for dew points which is likely a high bias, especially where westerly component winds are a drying downslope off the Allegany Plateau. Will lean on the current forecast which has already modified the NBM for local dry adiabatic mixing and climatology. One thing that could help keep high temperatures from reaching their fullest advertised potential, preventing upper 90s and even a few 100s air temperatures in urban areas will be afternoon convection. Unsettled conditions along a cold front dropping out of Canada this weekend will bring minor relief from the high heat and lower dew points a bit as well. KEY MESSAGE 2... Chances of Thunderstorms have been kept for each afternoon from Tuesday onwards as the dew points climb along with the temperatures. MLCAPE rises to 1000 to 2000 J/kg each afternoon. Right now, triggers for storms are tough to pin down as we are near the NE edge of the ridge with shortwaves that will be riding around the perimeter of the ridge...mostly to our north and east. Forecast soundings do keep come CIN and indicate a small temperature cap between 850-700 mb but it is not much. 700 mb temperatures hovering between 10C-12C are the poor man's cap indicator as well and we are covered by those temperatures especially Weds-Thurs. So barring remnants from upstream MCS complexes propagating southward into the low level moisture axis within the ridge, we should mainly see limited activity as storms may be able to fire without a trigger over higher terrain, then outflow from those could continue to support additional storms into the early evening. Tuesday still looks the most interesting for storms with some forcing as an Elevated Mixed Layer is moving through, leading to modeled 700-500 mb lapse rates near 8C/km. Shear is lacking (<30 knots) for a bigger event as well as a definable trigger, but many models at least fire off some convection...although latest runs of the GFS/NAM and ICON have trended to a lower potential or at least seem to be tracking storm solutions further north from the core of the ridge. Still have to keep the PoP numbers up during this period given the local potential noted above but am not too confident about the numerous or likely coverage. Downburst will be possible with initial convection given the CAPE and Mid Level Lapse rates. Forecast soundings also show warm cloud depths over 10K feet with potential for training given flow aloft so a flash flood risk is there as well high high rainfall rates that could approach two to three inches an hour within the deeply saturated airmass. The threat for downburst lessens and becomes more isolated Wednesday onwards as mid level lapse rates trends back towards 6C/km but the CAPE will be high each afternoon but offset by the capping. Low level flow and mid level flows align better later in the week for training storms so if we do get storms to fire or if the ridge does not build as far into New England with the ring of fire closer to our CWA, we could be dealing with a persistent flash flood risk, especially as deeper synoptic forcing tends to increase as the ridge breaks down. && .AVIATION /12Z MONDAY THROUGH FRIDAY/... Building ridge of high pressure will maintain VFR conditions through 12Z Tuesday. Minor predawn fog occurred at KITH-KELM this morning but appears doubtful for the coming night because an additional day of drying out and due to increasing flow just off the surface during predawn hours Tuesday. Outlook: Tuesday through Friday...Mostly VFR, but intermittent restrictions will be possible with isolated to scattered showers and thunderstorms each afternoon as well as valley fog at least for KELM in predawn hours each morning given humid environment; possibly others if prior rains occur. && .CLIMATE... Current High Temperature Records: 6/30: BGM - 92 (1964), SYR - 94 (1971), AVP - 97 (1964) 7/1: BGM - 90 (2018), SYR - 94 (2018), AVP - 95 (2018) 7/2: BGM - 92 (1966), SYR - 96 (1963), AVP - 98 (1966) Forecasts for 7/1 and 7/2 are at or near the daily records. && .BGM WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES... PA...None. NY...None. && $$ DISCUSSION...JAB AVIATION...MDP CLIMATE...MDP