85 at BWI ties record for the date

It is the second Monday in a row that the mercury has reached a record high in the 80s at BWI. For the Orioles' home opener April 4, the high was 86 degrees at 5 p.m. That broke the old record of 83 degrees, which had stood since 1956. The average high for an April 11 in Baltimore is 63 degrees.

Temperatures this time began to drop after clouds thickened ahead of tonight 's rain. It was 84 at 5 p.m. Forecasters said the 4 p.m. reading was likely to be the day's high at BWI.

Records at Washington's Reagan National Airport and Dulles International seemed safe this afternoon. It was 82 at Reagan at 4 p.m., where the record set in 1930 for the date is 91. At Dulles, the 4 p.m. reading was 84, and the record set in 1977 is 87 degrees.

The heat won't last.

"The high tomorrow [Tuesday] will only be ... 62 for Baltimore," said NWS meteorologist Heather Sheffield, from the regional forecast office in Sterling, Va. "The cold front moves through and the rain will continue into tomorrow."

"We have a kind of a low forming as the front goes through, and that will keep the showers around tomorrow," she said. "It looks like by late tomorrow [Tuesday] night the low will be moving off the coast."

That should bring the sun back sometime Wednesday or Thursday, forecasters said. More showers and thunderstorms are forecast for late Friday and Saturday. Daytime highs drop back to the 50s early next week.

(SUN PHOTO: Frank Roylance, 4/11/11)