HOT AND DRY IN THE MIDDLE OF JULY

We are fully under the influence of high pressure with the ridge holding form, for now, across the central US. Temperatures will continue to hold steady in the low/mid-90s through the week with limited rain chances to accompany it. In the short term humidity isn't too terrible, however dewpoints will likely continue to increase with 70s likely by midweek into Saturday, which will bring a return to those triple-digit heat indices.

However, as noted over the weekend, the ridge will likely begin to pivot to the west this weekend into early next week which will bring a return to northwest flow, and more seasonal temperatures, early next week. Short-term pain is there, however, with hot temperatures sticking around this week.

Analogs are well in line with the Climate Prediction Center forecast with generally dry conditions across our area, and wetter weather expected to the east and west where the ring of fire is to set up. I think there remains some potential for the storm track to clip our area this weekend, so I don't want to completely rule it out at this point, as the 500mb pattern begins to break down.

You can see the pattern break down early next week, roughly Monday/Tuesday. That storm track and northwest flow gets quite close to our area. This likely brings some cooler temperatures and lower humidity in addition to the chance of storms.

The European Ensemble is starting to hint at some rain potential around Monday which would match up with that upper air transition. That is likely the most likely window to watch for storms, but there is some additional signal on Friday July 17 as well on some of the global models. This will be interesting to watch once the higher resolution modeling is in range. No organized action however is likely through the middle part of July.

Running the European Ensemble all the way through July 28 shows the Upper Midwest sitting rather dry. In fact this is likely going to be on the the driest areas in the country over the next two weeks. We're sitting OK for now, but we will need rain soon before we start getting into some drought issues.

Have a wonderful week, friends!

-Meteorologist Nick Stewart