National Weather Service forecasts more rain
By ROB PRICE THE COURIER-ADVOCATE

If you're getting tired of the rain, you're not alone. Even the weatherman is getting the precipitation blues.

"We're just like everybody else," said Brian Lovejoy, National Weather Service meteorologist in Binghamton. "We don't like the weather, but there's nothing anyone can do about it."

Lovejoy last week confirmed the easy suspicion the Southern Tier has seen more than its share of rainfall since the end of summer. October rainfall, he noted, totaled 4.3 inches - 1.3 inches above normal - and rainfall in the first two weeks of November amounted to 2.3 inches, more than half an inch above normal.

The forecast doesn't get any better. Lovejoy said the National Weather Service expects conditions to remain the same through the weekend and into the new week. "For the most part, it's going to be cloudy with some type of precipitation almost everyday," he said.

It's all part of life in the Southern tier, Lovejoy insisted, in spite of the higherthan normal rainfall. "This is November in upstate New York," he said. "It's normal climatology; this is not unusual."

So, what is causing the rain? According to Lovejoy, "The steering winds in the upper atmosphere are the driving process. They have aligned themselves over the eastern United States to produce what we call a 'trof.' Look at the steering winds: They dive south, then dive back up in a V or U shape. That kind of pattern helps steer storms at the surface into the region."

The meteorological term "trof" also can be spelled "trough." In either case, Lovejoy said, the fall season's typical high-altitude air patterns tend to suck damp air from the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean into the northeast.

And why do these trof-producing higher-altitude air patterns exist in the first place? "There's no definitive research on how a pattern like a trof sets up," Lovejoy said.

And he offered some parting advice for sun-starved residents of the Southern Tier. "If you're looking for good weather, you're basically out of luck."