STILL SOME GAS IN THE TANK

Temperatures began to inch up around the region Wednesday as the final remnants of last week's cool air shuffled off to the east. A building ridge and southerly flow will now become dominate and bring well above normal temperatures to the Midwest for at least a week. You can see a fairly stagnant upper level pattern at 500mb through Tuesday of next week, with well above normal heights and a southwesterly component to the flow. That should be more than enough to get some 90s back in here for the weekend and part of next week.

These are the temperature departures on the EURO for both Saturday and Sunday. There's a lot of red showing right up the spine of the Mississippi, showing the extent of the warmth over the nation's mi-section.

Saturday

Sunday

The latest trends show temperature departures are likely to be 18–20 degrees above normal into Wednesday of next week. That's far warmer than the EURO showed yesterday and closer to what the GFS has been indicating for several days. I have poo pooed the degree of warmth shown by the GFS the last few days, but have to give the model respect as the EURO is trending closer to the warmer solution of the GFS and is more persistent with the heat locally into the middle of next week. Hopefully I'm on now on the right track now with models coming into better agreement. The EURO shows this for temperature departures Sunday.

Here's what the EURO is depicting for highs in the Quad Cities by way of its meteogram the next 2 weeks. Temperatures build from the low 80s Thursday to the upper 80s Friday and then crest near 94 to 95 when the ridge is overhead and at its strongest Saturday through Thursday of next week.

The EURO

Here's the GFS which is no longer an outlier and in fact is now just a hair cooler than the EURO through Thursday of next week.

Fortunately, dew points will only be in the range of 62-64 much of the next 6 days which keeps heat index values under control, at best only a couple of degrees higher than the actual temperatures. Thus, it's unlikely heat advisories will be issued, but it will be toasty just the same. Summer still has some gas in the tank.

Due to meager moisture and lack of forcing, it appears dry weather is likely to persist in most areas through the weekend. By then, the dry trend we are experiencing will be closing in on 4 weeks. Going back to August 18th, rainfall deficits in my area have reached 2.5 to 3.3 inches. The core of the dryness is centered on the SE quadrant of Iowa, much of Missouri, into central Illinois.

We could all use a good rain, but it certainly isn't in the cards until we can shift the storm track further east and tap into a decent moisture plume. Potential does increase some towards the middle of next week. Even so, I don't see anything that resembles a widespread wet pattern. What we experience in terms of rain is likely to be scattered in nature at best. These are the precipitation departures on the EURO for the 7-day period ending next Wednesday. With little in the way of significant rain, deficits should continue to mount.

Shorter term through Sunday of this weekend, (the next 96 hours), the GFS indicates little if any rain.

Two weeks from now, the GFS indicates the return of NW flow, which implies the heat we will see through the middle of next week should break down shortly thereafter. We may experience another brief warm-up next weekend before the trough shown below brings a substantial cool-off around September 24th. Hopefully we can squeeze out a decent rain somewhere in the 2-week period coming up.

There's not much more to say other than the heat will soon be on us. Meantime, look for a mild but pleasant day today with light winds, low humidity, and plenty of sunshine before the tide turns. Sounds good to me. Roll weather...TS