Near record highs today

Warm air continues to invade the St. Lawrence Valley this morning on strong southwest winds. Along the leading edge of the warmer air, shower activity is occurring, that should taper off shortly. Winds will further increase to between 40 and 70km/h for most of the day. The record high for Montreal today is 17.2 set in 1959. If we see a few breaks of sunshine that record may fall with highs forecast close to 16C, again well above normal for mid-November. No snow is in sight at this time through mid-week with just a chance of some flurries by weeks end. It will remain mild through late Wednesday before a strong cold front drops temperatures closer to the normal high of 5C for Montreal. Looking ahead into next week that arctic outbreak I talked about building over Alaska and the arctic region will start to move south into the Rockies and Prairies. Snow and biting cold is expected as far south and east as the northern US and western Great Lakes. It is too soon to tell exactly how far south and east the cold air will move.