WELL IT'S ABOUT TIME...
You can't undo something that's taken months to create. That's certainly true of the long standing drought much of my area is fighting. However, this past week was one of the better ones of the summer for rain around the Midwest with most areas (aside from my SW counties) seeing 1/2 to 2 inches of rain through Monday morning. Here's the 7 day totals from the Midwest Climate Center.
Despite the rain, my counties in eastern Iowa and NW Illinois still fell short of the 7 day means for September 18th to the 24th.
That's unfortunate as that part of my area continues to experience severe to exceptional drought. Further NW though, the results were much better in NE IOWA, SE Minnesota, and SW Wisconsin where 2-5 inch rains had a real impact.
Speaking of impacts, rain continued to fall overnight in parts of my northern counties and points NW. This is due to a slow moving cut-off low drifting slowly southeast. The effects of the system are expected to be felt in my area the next couple of days as rounds of vorticity (lift) circulate around the center. Most of my area will see rain but the storm track favors the NE half of my area for the higher totals. With water vapor of 1.00 to 1.25 inches multiple waves of rain producing energy could deliver heavy downpours until the moist conveyor belt shifts to off to the east Wednesday night. Pockets of 1-2" rains are consistently shown from about the Quad Cities north and east). Some localized 3"+ amounts are possible in slow moving thunderstorms. Here's some suggested rain totals from the models.
The EURO
The GFS
The 3k NAM
Another minor concern is the potential for a few strong storms Tuesday. There is enough shear and potential CAPE (instability) for some marginal hail and gusty winds of 40-50 in the strongest updrafts. SPC shows a low risk severe weather outlook. The NWS is also mentioning the low CAPE high shear environment that could lead to some brief funnels or spins ups but these are typically small, short lasting, and damage free. Something to keep an eye on.
With this slow moving system impacting the area for the next 72 hours, I don't look for much change in daily temperatures. Lows Tuesday-Thursday should be near 60 with highs upper 60s to mid 70s, perhaps a bit warmer in the SW where less rainfall is expected.
WARMER DAYS ARE IN OUR FUTURE...
By the end of the week, the closed upper air low finally gets kicked east ending rain chances and bringing the return of sunshine. Additionally, a 500mb ridge develops and amplifies going into the weekend. Heights are shown spiking well above normal for late September leading to above normal temperatures. Highs Saturday and Sunday are likely to reach the 80s. The EURO shows 7 day mean temperature departures for the period September 30th to October 6th that are rather toasty.
The Climate Prediction Center shows very high chances of above normal temperatures October 1-5th.
Precipitation is likely to be limited during this period so we better get all the rain we can the next 2 days.
With that, I will wrap this up and move on. I'm hoping for a nice rain in the spots that need it most. Until next time, roll weather....TS
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