The latest European Weeklies are in and suggest that the worst of the heat will be behind us after next week (for the summer as a whole). Let’s take a look at the upcoming period into the latter part of July to see where the model believes the rest of the month goes from here.
Week 2: July 8-15
Below average temperatures are expected across the Plains into the Ohio Valley and Great Lakes region while the warmth is “shoved” west and south.
Week 3: July 15-22
Cooler air is expected to dominate across the central and northern Plains while the West Coast and Deep South remains warmer than normal. The central Plains into the western Great Lakes region looks wet for Week 3.
Week 4: July 22-29
Common theme of below normal temperatures continues across the Plains into the Great Lakes with warmth across the West and South. To no surprise, the Southern Plains looks to run dry where the above normal warmth persists while above normal rainfall is shown by the model across the Ohio Valley into the southern Great Lakes.
This is another “tool in the belt,” so to speak, and our official July Forecast can be found here.
I.Briefly Refreshing: A badly needed dry stretch of weather will be short-lived- 24 hours at most for the majority of central Indiana, and that’s if you’re lucky. This evening, however, will offer a much drier brand of air building into the area along with dew points and temperatures falling into the middle to upper 50s. Areas of dense fog will be possible Friday morning in spots.
A brief refreshing change will take place tonight into Friday morning, including lows in the mid to upper 50s across central IN.
II. Tropical Air Returns: Just as soon as the drier air mass arrives, it’ll depart. We’ll go from morning dew points in the middle 50s Friday to upper 60s by evening and into the lower 70s by Saturday evening. It’s safe to the say that once to Saturday afternoon the humidity will be back with authority.
III. Warm Front Provides Focus For Storms: A warm front will lift northeast over the weekend and serve focus for hefty storms clusters to track in a northwest to southeast fashion. The first of a series of these clusters will likely arrive into the state late Friday morning or early afternoon and most likely affect the southwest portion of the state.
We believe the drier air mass will initially serve to shunt the storms to our southwest, but as an increasingly moist air mass lifts north, better chances of storms will return Friday evening into Saturday morning. This is a tough pattern to get specific with timing these storms clusters, but it’s safe to say central Indiana will come under the gun for multiple rounds of storms through the weekend and into early next week.
IV. Warmer; Drier Trends: While we can’t completely eliminate rain and storm chances, the trends continue to move towards a warmer and drier pattern building in here in the medium range (6-10 day period, or the overall period through the middle of next week into next weekend) as an upper level ridge builds over the Ohio Valley.
Enjoy while we have it as we continue to believe the pattern will return to an overall cooler and wetter theme for the bulk of July.
V. NEW European Weeklies: The updated European Weeklies are in and while they keep a warmer than normal pattern in place through the first 1/3 of July, they are bullish on signaling the return of a cooler regime around or shortly after the 10th. After a drier theme early July, wetter conditions are also signaled on the updated model data for the 2nd half of the month.
After an active evening across central Indiana on Wednesday, I’m excited to say the upcoming 48-72 hours looks much calmer overall. All of the “action” will be off to our south the next couple of days with mixed clouds and sun and seasonable warmth dominating across central Indiana.
Sunshine returns across central Indiana today and will remain in place as we close out the work week.
Highs today and Friday will top out in the lower to middle 80s.
While we’ll remain dry across central Indiana to wrap up the work week, better chances of showers will remain across far southern portions of the state (closer to the influence of the upper low swirling across the southern Plains and into the Ark-La-Tex region tomorrow).
The upper low will move closer to the region over the weekend and result in better shower coverage as we move into Saturday and Sunday (still not looking at wash-outs either day).
An average of various computer models prints out rainfall amounts between 0.50″ and 1″ in the Saturday through Monday time period.
High pressure will build in Tuesday and Wednesday, supplying a return of dry conditions.
A cold front and associated area of low pressure will approach Thursday and this will serve to deliver a round of scattered thunderstorms as we make the transition towards next weekend. A few gusty storms are a good bet Thursday with this frontal system. With this being a week out, we’ll continue to keep an eye on things and be able to get more specific with time. Perhaps as big of a story will be the unseasonably cool air that will blow into town behind the front to close next week. Lows in the 40s and highs in the upper 60s to lower 70s seem likely and a far cry from what we’d normally expect for mid-June.
Recently, a “transient” pattern has dominated. This has kept any sort of long-lasting cold at bay and resulted in above normal precipitation. As we get set to close out February and welcome in a new month, a pattern change is on the horizon.
This overall shift in the pattern will drive a more sustained and significantly colder than normal regime southeast. In short, cold is set to “overwhelm” the pattern through the first couple of weeks of March. In the most extreme case (especially if we can get snow down), we will be able to challenge records at some point during the 1st (10) days of the month.
In spite of a neutral to positive AO and NAO, a significantly negative EPO and MJO rumbling through the cold late Feb and early March phases look to trump the otherwise warm signals. We also can’t forget about the significant SOI crash. Let’s dig into some of the latest data:
CFSv2
Note the modeling spreading the cold out during the Weeks 2-3 time period before gradually modifying things as we move into the middle and latter portion of March. The mean storm track shifts to the east during the first couple of weeks of the month (pattern will likely be dominated by more snow vs. rain events during this time period) before wetter than normal conditions return for the 2nd half of the month.
JMA Weeklies
Week 1
Week 2
Weeks 3-4
Like the CFSv2, the model overwhelms the pattern with cold during the Week 2 time period. Also similar to the CFSv2, the JMA Weeklies bring ridging back into the East and associated warmth by mid-month. While we haven’t included the precipitation anomalies in this post, the model does bring wetter than normal conditions back into the area by mid-March.
European Weeklies
The NEW European Weeklies remain consistent from Monday’s update (and data above) in delivering a very cold 1st half of March. The core of the cold looks to be centered over the upper Midwest and Northern Plains, but temperatures for the balance of the first couple weeks of the month will likely resemble what we’d expect in late January or early February vs. March. While precipitation will likely run below normal (thanks to the cold pattern), the model deliver above normal snowfall during the period. As we move into the 2nd half of the month, warmer (and wetter) conditions are shown to return.
Given all of the above, we expect the primary upper air pattern to feature a central and eastern trough through the 1st half of March before that trough settles into the West during the 2nd half of the month. This will open up the eastern portion of the country for not only warmer air, but a return of moisture-laden storm systems and the potential of strong-severe storms at times.
A new week has dawned and with it will come a very busy weather pattern. Thankfully, today we’ll enjoy a “hint of spring,” including temperatures approaching the 60 deg. mark…
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