It hasn't felt much like winter the past few days, but let the word go forth, our spring fling is on hold for a couple of days. A strong cold front has carved a path through the region and temperatures Friday will be as much as 36 degrees colder than just 24 hours earlier. At noon Thursday, you can see a band of low clouds in white stretched out from South Dakota, Minnesota, northern Iowa, and Wisconsin, representing the cold air surging in behind the cold front Friday. At no

Temperatures took off again Wednesday reaching the the mid to upper 70s (with Keokuk registering 81). Another mild day is on tap Thursday before a strong cold front drives substantially colder air into the region Friday. The persistent warmth has been in place since the official start of winter December 21st, impressive considering the snow and cold post Thanksgiving into the first two weeks of December. This graphic shows the average temperature departure for winter 2025-26.

Nothing says March like fluctuating temperatures. This whole month has been nothing but wild ups and downs and with 6 days to go we are far from done. On a positive note, we'll lean more towards the warm side of average as opposed to the cold. Here's where things stand. In the big picture, this March is going down as a blow torch. Below are the months temperature departures through the 23rd. I would say 98-99% of the nation is above average. In fact, it's been so warm that Ma

While we got the week off to a fine start Monday with plenty of sunshine, it was a bit crisp around the edges. Steve Gottschalk reported to me the day started with a low of 24 in Lowden, a robust 64 degrees colder than 39 hours earlier when the mercury read 88 Saturday. Specaking of extremes, here's one you won't see very often. The low March 17th in Cedar Rapids was zero, 4 days later the 21st, the high was 89. Yes, you did the math right, that was a jump of 89 degrees in ab

The end of March is lacking any major excitement from a weather standpoint, but longer-term forecasts are showing an uptick in activity as we move into April with ensemble guidance and analog support. This could be a somewhat active stretch overall with multiple waves of storms moving through the central US as the pattern that builds in supports a somewhat active pattern. Analogs are all in on well above normal temperatures in the region as the active weather pattern takes ov