A SUNDAY SOAKER AHEAD OF A RETURN TO SUMMER

Once again we will be flirting with the potential for severe weather locally, but the threat this time around should remain well to the south of the area. Locally, a Father's Day Sunday Soaker is in the forecast. Areas generally along/south of Highway 30 are looking primed for a heavy rain event. The HRRR (above) is indicating rainfall totals of 1-2" for the southern half of Iowa through 7 a.m. Monday.

Moderate the heavy rain moves in after sunrise Sunday as the leading edge of our weathermaker clips the region. The Quad Cities area should get into the rain by 7-9 a.m. with showers likely through much of the day. The HRRR forecast radar above is valid 8 a.m.

By 3 p.m. Sunday (HRRR forecast above) the showers will continue locally with the activity slowly diminishing after about 5 p.m. Pretty much all of the area should see rain Sunday at some point with the heaviest, again, remaining south of Highway 20. The Highway 30/Highway 34/I-80 corridors likely get into the heaviest rainfall likely eclipsing 1".

The main story for the upcoming week will be the seasonally comfortable temperatures before we likely see a pretty big wamup heading into late June/early July. The overall pattern looks to support a return to normal with increasing storm chances as well.

Signals are starting to show above-normal chances for precipitation heading into early next week. The overall upper air pattern, in my opinion, looks to support organized severe weather across the Northern Plains, and that generally leads to overnight convective complexes of storm in our direction with some potential for severe weather - mainly the damaging eind variety.

Analogs for example are showing this heightened potential of severe weather with the probabilities of at least one severe weather report June 28-July 1 sitting around 70% in our area. As the pattern evolves we will likely get greater clarity on how things will unfold, but in terms of forecasting, this is my main focus going forward.

The European Ensemble is hinting at this robust western troughing bringing southwest flow aloft. This will bring the heat and the moisture - fuel for active weather. The summer severe weather season is likely just getting started.

Meanwhile I am just wrapping up my storm chasing vacation. The weather pattern really didn't give us a lot to work with but we managed several storm chases, numerous tornado-warmed storms and many photogenic supercells. I will try and get a post up in the coming days logging our chasing trip. But for now, I need to catch up on sleep. Have a great week everyone!

-Meteorologist Nick Stewart