FEELING THE LOVE, FOR NOW...
Nothing says love like an 80 degree day bundled with low humidity, a gentle breeze, and some fair weather cumulus. That was the Grant Wood artistry that prevailed in our weather Tuesday. I don't know about you but I was feeling the love.
GRANT WOOD 1941
Overall, the fine mid summer weather pattern will go largely uninterrupted the remainder of the week. There is a weak disturbance that ripples over the area late Tuesday night and very early Wednesday that might scare up a few showers. Forcing is weak and moisture limited so anybody that picks up a shower can expect only light amounts. Here's what models are suggesting for rain ending early Wednesday.
The GFS
THE model blend
The 3K NAM
The EURO
Skies clear out quickly Wednesday and the balance of the day looks mostly sunny and pleasant. Highs will hold in the upper 70s to low 80s.
Wednesday night another weak impulse slips in providing a small chance of light widely scattered showers. What few of these can develop should be out of the area shortly after daybreak Thursday setting the stage for another outstanding late July day. Highs will likely remain in the 70s, perhaps 80 in the far south. The GFS shows temperatures 8-10 degrees below normal in most of the region.
Readings are expected to remain comfortable Friday and Saturday before winds veer to the southwest allowing warmer more humid air to begin accessing the region Sunday. Highs both days will generally be in the range of 80-84, a few degrees below normal. Sunday mid to upper 80s are back on the table. As it stands now the entire weekend appears to be rain free and sunshine abundant.
HEATING UP NEXT WEEK.
Lots of questions exist next week regarding the extent and degree of the heat that's shown building over the Midwest during the long range period. CPC is bullish on the potential showing well above normal temperatures in both it's 6-10 and 8-14 day day outlooks. These cover the period July 26th to August 9th.
The warmth makes complete sense with a 500mb pattern that's projected to look like this on the GFS August 6th.
On a scaled back basis, the EURO also shows the expanding heat dome implying hot conditions are back in our future August 2nd and beyond. As was the case 24 hours ago, the GFS remains a huge outlier in terms of potential highs. Here's what it's meteogram shows for highs in Davenport. Not as extreme as yesterday but still in the top 1% of August's hottest days. Again, the trend for heat may be accurate on the GFS but the numbers seem overdone by at least 10 degrees. Let's hope so!
The GFS
The EURO agrees heat is coming but it's chump change compared to the EURO. It's far more realistic in its depiction. Here's what it shows
The model blend output indicates even slightly less heat than the EURO.
Here's what the EURO and GFS indicates for 10-15 day temperature departures August 5th-10th...the peak of the coming heat. That looks steamy!
The EURO
The GFS
Assuming the heat dome develops as it appears it will, precipitation will be tough to come by as we go from moisture starved NW flow to a highly capped storm prohibitive atmosphere under the expanding heat dome. The EURO shows this for rainfall departures the next 2 weeks.
The GFS is riding the same train.
From the looks of it, it's the tale of two types of temperatures for us going forward. Things will be nice and comfortable into the weekend before summer takes a late season stand the first half of August. Give those air conditioners a break, they should get a serious workout in the not too distant future. Roll weather...TS
