Buzz Lightyear, Derpy Tiger and other pop culture icons could face a bit of turbulence as they float in Macy’s Thanksgiving parade, with windy weather forecast for the New York area.
According to the National Weather Service, Thursday will bring sustained winds of 15 to 20 mph and gusts up to 35 mph across the city during one of the year’s busiest travel times.
Spectators lining Central Park West and Sixth Avenue in Manhattan for the parade’s 99th year will want to bundle up, meteorologist Bryan Ramsey said.
“ Even though the highs are above freezing, the wind chill will probably feel like, at its warmest, it's in the mid-30s,” he said.
The blustery weather will start Wednesday night, as temperatures drop from nearly 60 degrees to the upper 30s.
“ Once that cold front pushes through tonight, we're going to have colder air kind of settling in and winds increasing,” Ramsey said.
A spokesperson for Macy's said the company and NYPD are monitoring Thursday's conditions and will make a final decision on "if the balloons will fly and at what heights" before the parade begins. At the 1997 parade, high winds caused handlers to lose control of a Cat in the Hat balloon, which crashed into a lamppost and resulted in a bystander being seriously injured.
The predicted gusts will continue into Friday, when they could peak at 40 to 45 mph during the day, Ramsey said. High temperatures are expected to hover in the low 40s that day, but wind chills will make it feel more like the 30s, and even the 20s overnight, he added.
Saturday will start to warm up slightly as the winds finally relax, and Sunday will warm back up into the 50s, according to NWS.
This story has been updated with additional information.
