Thanksgiving is a week away and more than 80 million Americans are planning to travel at least 50 miles from home. But the weather has the potential to disrupt their visits with family and friends.
Most of those travelers — 73 million — are expected to hit the road with about 6 million set to take to the skies, according to estimates from AAA.
There are no major storms on the horizon in the run up to Thanksgiving, so the overall potential for major weather-induced disruptions is lower than recent years, but pockets of wet and windy weather could still cause less-widespread issues.
Here’s what Mother Nature is serving up over the next several days. To make it easier to skim, we’ve rated potential disruptions each day on a scale of 1 — minimal issues — to 5 — impossible travel.
Saturday will be rainy at times for parts of the East. Rain isn’t likely to be heavy enough to cause problems on its own, but it could prompt some slow-going road travel, especially early. The dreary weather could also lower visibility at times, potentially causing delays at large airport hubs from Washington, DC, to New York City.
On the other side of the country, a storm will bring wet weather to parts of Southern California and the Desert Southwest on Saturday as it tracks near the US-Mexico border. It will be a soggy travel day for places not used to it, like San Diego and Phoenix.
That same storm will continue tracking east on Sunday, bringing wet weather to lower elevations and perhaps some snow to mountainous areas of the Four Corners region. Rain will also start to push into the Southern Plains during the day but will likely get heavier overnight.
Soaking rain is possible in the Southern Plains, especially in much of Texas and parts of southern Oklahoma. This rain could be heavy enough to cause flooding issues.
Dallas and Austin, Texas, are already under a Level 2 of 4 risk of flooding rain Sunday into Monday morning, according to the Weather Prediction Center. Heavy rain could be a major pain point for travelers flying out of Dallas Fort Worth International Airport.
Travelers in the East have better conditions expected — largely dry and not very windy. Much of the West is in a similar position except for some rain and high-elevation snow from a storm set to hit the Pacific Northwest.